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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26939419">there's a version of the future (hanging close above my head)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/santamonicayachtclub/pseuds/makemadej'>makemadej (santamonicayachtclub)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series), Watcher Entertainment RPF</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Barebacking, Body Calligraphy, Daddy Kink, Dirty Talk, Impregnation Kink, Kink Discovery, M/M, Recreational Drug Use, Rimming, Sex Toys, Sexting, Wax Play, feminizing dirty talk, this is quite wholesome really</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 16:49:34</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>24,827</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26939419</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/santamonicayachtclub/pseuds/makemadej</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Shane’s relationships have always been pretty vanilla. Ryan takes up calligraphy. These two things are directly connected.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Ryan Bergara/Shane Madej</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>75</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>300</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>there's a version of the future (hanging close above my head)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I wanted to try a different twist on the whole daddy kink thing by having Ryan just completely own it and Shane be the one who needs a little coaxing. This was supposed to be shorter, but that all changed when the fire nation attacked. PS, both these boys are vers as heck and that's the gospel truth.</p><p>Thank you to data queen Catt for her Watcher timeline and beta badass Bee for catching my glitches 🥰</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The first time Ryan attempts to have this conversation, they're in a bustling Koreatown pub. </p><p>They’re packed shoulder to shoulder with dozens of other patrons at the polished maple bar, splitting the unlikely but satisfying combination of nigiri and tater tots. Shane thinks he might pull a muscle from trying not to cringe and Ryan is blithely chowing down like this is no big deal. And it really isn’t, in the grand scheme of their interlocked history. They fell into the habit of casually drinking with each other years ago, long before they fell into the habit of not-so-casually dating each other.</p><p>Except.</p><p>There may be a small issue with Ryan’s sense of timing.</p><p>“I just think it's helpful to talk about this stuff before anything major happens,” he’s saying, only it’s more like shouting. Shane unconsciously glances around, irrationally convinced every other person in the venue is eavesdropping.</p><p>“You know, so there aren't any unpleasant surprises,” Ryan goes on. Despite the volume, he sounds calm almost to the point of blasé, which is altogether unfair for someone who just blithely decided he might like men after a lifetime of solid, unquestioning heterosexuality. “I mean, if I really have a thing for wearing high heels and you have a tragic high heel incident in your past or whatever, you know?”</p><p>Ryan has been so chill about this that Shane can't help feeling a little envious. He's kissed Shane good morning at Buzzfeed and kissed him more than that when they finished moving into the Watcher office the other day. He's said things like “hey, sexuality is a tricky beast” and “this means you're my personal game changer, put that on your LinkedIn profile.”</p><p>He's told his <em> mom</em>.</p><p>Shane knows this because he was there for it when he made the phone call. Ryan’s hand had been tight in his as he’d listened, gobsmacked, to Ryan talk with giddy excitement about his boyfriend. He’s still not quite able to balance the equation, to reconcile the fact that the person capable of making Ryan sound like that is <em> him</em>. </p><p>The longest he ever dated a guy was for a year or so in college and even then it took him until month six to tell his parents, in typical low-key Schaumburg fashion. He’d broken the news without fanfare, tacking on “oh, and I’ve been seeing this guy” almost as an afterthought, which proceeded to get him a “well, all righty then” from his dad and a “whatever makes you happy, honey” from his mom. And that was all.</p><p>It’s been just short of a month since they kissed for the first time, and October has been so jammed with obligations they’ve barely had a chance to do anything more. They've kissed and cuddled and drifted together as naturally and easily as a pair of magnets. If they spend the night together, it’s exhausted and twined around each other like a double helix. They haven’t exactly been on the fast track to debauchery. </p><p>Shane would be happy to plunge themselves right into it, but Ryan seems to have a more methodical approach in mind.</p><p>He’s still pleading his case. “We’ve gotta make more time for this,” he insists, popping another tot into his mouth. “I don’t want to spring anything on you that you’re not into.” </p><p>Shane has been living what he privately calls the neurotic bisexual lifestyle for over a decade and he still doesn’t have Ryan’s easy confidence. If it hasn’t happened by now, it probably never will. He rolls his shoulders back in an affectedly casual shrug. “I don't have any traumatic experiences, it's all good.”</p><p>“Yeah? What about what you’re into? No crazy sexy cool stuff you want to share with the class?”</p><p>Shane pointedly looks at the crowd around them. “With you, maybe. With the class? Not so much.”</p><p>Ryan giggles and orders them another round of sake. “Got it.”</p><p>Afterward, once they've caught a Lyft back to Shane's place, Ryan cradles his face in his hands. </p><p>“Shane,” he says, peering into his eyes with an intensity that makes Shane feel like he’s been stripped bare. “You’ve gotta remember, it’s LA. Everyone’s way too preoccupied with themselves to care about what some randos at the bar are saying. And even if they did, hearing two guys talking about sex stuff—not even, just laying the <em> groundwork </em>for talking about sex stuff later—is not that big of a deal.” </p><p>“I never said it was—” Shane halfheartedly protests, but Ryan has a talent for cutting him off with kisses and he’s not afraid to use it.</p><p>“At most, someone knows who were are and goes online and is like, ‘holy fuck, I swear I saw Ryan Bergara talking about how he has a fetish for high heels.’ And someone else will be like ‘yeah right, how drunk were you though?’ and someone else will be like ‘have you seen that one video where he tries to walk in heels and sucks more than anyone?’ and it’ll all fizzle out.” </p><p>Shane combs his fingers through Ryan’s hair, half-smiling in spite of himself. </p><p>Ryan presses into the touch, his eyes sliding closed. There’s a yawn pushing at the underside of his words. “Or maybe they’ll be like, ‘hell to the yeah, look at this king, destroying toxic masculinity one stiletto at a time.’ Dude. Maybe I <em> should </em>get into heels.”  </p><p>Shane laughs and kisses him and they don’t talk about it then and he’s silently glad.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Ryan tries for the second time to bring it up when they're a little drunk and a little high and a little handsy. </p><p>He’s just gotten back from a solo trip to speak at the College of New Jersey and tomorrow afternoon they're leaving for Colorado to film the Doctor Sleep promo minisode at the Stanley Hotel. But for now, in the brief interlude between the two, it’s just them.</p><p>Ryan is lolling on his back in Shane’s bed, limbs akimbo and eyes hooded, not unlike Obi when he’s all sated and satisfied after a good dose of catnip.</p><p>Obi, for various reasons, has been banished from Shane’s room tonight. </p><p>“Missed your face,” Ryan mumbles, soft as the smoke he breathes into Shane’s mouth. </p><p>“You were gone for, like, a day and a half,” Shane points out, after gamely letting the smoke seethe its way into his lungs.</p><p>Ryan cups a hand to his ear. “What’s that? You missed me too? Awww, thanks, buddy!” His bare foot notches against the jut of Shane’s hip and gives a little shove. “I was out there all alone, dude, trying to act like a responsible adult and give the Asian American Association their money’s worth.”</p><p>He’d texted Shane frantically while trying to pack for this, seeking reassurance that jeans and a Mickey t-shirt were indeed appropriate attire for a chill college interview. On Shane’s suggestion, he’d swapped out sneakers for ghoul boots.</p><p>Shane’s hand circles his ankle, his thumb mapping the little jut of bone there. “I know you were, baby,” he murmurs. It’s still strange to hear himself calling Ryan that, strange enough that he can’t quite look him in the eye no matter how good the word feels on his tongue. He lets his gaze linger lower as he lets his touch drift higher, up the tensed length of Ryan’s calf to the knob of his knee where it’s bent between them. “And I bet you killed it. Killed it deader than any ghost you’ve ever met.”</p><p>Ryan’s laugh curls around him, drowsily affectionate. “You don’t believe in ghosts...but thanks.”</p><p>Shane exhales a lazy stream of smoke, watching Ryan through the haze of it. “Yeah, but you do, and that’s what makes it matter.” He passes over the joint as his other hand crests Ryan’s knee, seeking out the tender dip of skin behind it. “I believe in other stuff, but I can’t say you killed it like...like Russia killed Napoleon’s army. That doesn’t have the same oomph.”</p><p>“I’ll give <em> you </em>oomph,” Ryan mumbles. His boxers have slid up to the join of his thigh. Shane’s fingers obligingly trace the swath of skin there, dipping underneath the fabric to push it up a bit more, until he’s a hair’s breadth away from brushing the bulge of his balls.</p><p>He lets himself touch. Ryan’s mouth parts around a soft moan.</p><p>It’s as unnerving as it is exhilarating how much Shane wants him. He wants him like this, biting back and giving him guff, but at the same time so trusting and touchable. He wants to wrap the moment around himself until the easy intimacy of it settles into every curve and crevice of his memory.</p><p>Ryan’s gone silent, biting his lip so hard it looks painful. He does this sometimes when things heat up between them, Shane’s noticed, tries to silence himself in a way he never does any other time. It catches like a hook behind Shane’s heart whenever he spots him doing it. All he can do is ply Ryan with kisses to ease him up, tonguing the abused plumpness of his bottom lip. </p><p>Beneath him, Ryan squirms his hips. Shane is still rubbing gently at his balls, breath catching when Ryan gives another shimmy and the head of his cock slips free of his waistband.</p><p>In short order, the joint gets discarded along with Ryan’s underwear. </p><p>Even though their bodies are radiating heat like twin stoves, Shane instinctively burrows closer against him. He's sweat-sticky and slick with precome inside his own underwear, and he struggles to shed it without letting go of Ryan. He succeeds in rucking the fabric down to his thighs, then braces himself on both arms over Ryan to let their cocks bump and graze against each other. This puts Ryan roughly at mouth level with his chest, but somehow Shane is still so taken by surprise when Ryan’s lips brush against his nipple that it makes his whole body give a jolt.</p><p>Ryan squirms again, arms wrapping tight around him as he sucks the hard little nub into his hot mouth.</p><p>“Fuck, you feel good,” Shane breathes. His fingers are tangling their way into Ryan’s hair and he tugs lightly, brings Ryan’s mouth back against his own and drinks him down like wine. He drops kisses all over Ryan’s rough, pink-dashed cheeks and, this time, he’s bold enough to meet his gaze. “Let me see you, sweetheart.” </p><p>For all Ryan likes to whine about his hip flexors, his legs fall open easily, exposing the swell of his balls, the thick, devastating length of his cock. Shane has an urge to reach lower still and thumb him open, baring the secret sweetness of his hole, where Shane sucked a finger and slipped it inside him just once, until Ryan blushed a beautiful cherry red and came all over himself. They’re stumbling too quickly towards coming already, though, too buzzed to pause for negotiations, so he refrains. Instead, Shane tucks himself into the golden sprawl of his thighs, lets those strong legs cage him in good and close, and deftly slides a hand around them both. </p><p>Ryan gives a deep, pleased moan against Shane’s throat. And that...that is very, <em> very </em>good too.</p><p>His fingers dig into the muscle of Shane’s back and his lips part against the join of Shane’s neck. He nuzzles him there, almost innocently, letting out muffled sounds of contentment. And then he sucks, hard enough to make Shane’s dick pulse out a stream of precome. He’s going to leave a hickey if he keeps this up, but Shane’s competent with a beauty blender and Colorado means sweater weather, so he lets Ryan go to town, leaving his mouthy mark on him as Shane jerks them off.</p><p>It’s all over rather quickly, but they’re in no rush to ease apart. There’s no need to do much of anything but lie there satiated and sticky and maybe a little shy. This is, after all, an exception for them rather than the norm. Their intimate interactions thus far have mostly been limited to deep kisses, exploratory touches, and sleeping together in the most literal sense. Other than that one foray into finger-fucking, the most they’ve done has involved grinding against each other in the early morning light, drowsy and needy, sliding hands down each other's boxers and swallowing each other's moans. This is one of the only occasions where they've had the luxury of letting loose and taking their time. </p><p>It has all the makings of an addiction, Shane can tell.</p><p>He’ll always crave times like these now that he knows how they feel. He already craves Ryan however he'll let him have him and as often as their blistering work hours allow. There’s a small, cynical part of him that insists he and Ryan are on borrowed time and is hell-bent on counting down the days until he screws this up. One of Shane’s many Ryan-related goals is to crush that part of him like a bug and prove it wrong a thousand times over.</p><p>In the background, his Spotify is still quietly working its way through a mellow indie playlist. “I miss you when you’re around,” he warbles along with Modest Mouse, and he means for it to sound corny, but his voice comes out so much tighter and quieter than he means it to.</p><p>Ryan reaches out and pulls him close. “You're such a good boyfriend.”</p><p>"If you were any cheesier, I’d consider cannibalism,” Shane says automatically, but he’s smiling, warmth rushing through him like Ryan reached inside his heart and turned up the thermostat. Ryan, Shane learned years ago, tends to have that effect. </p><p>“Shut up, I like saying it,” Ryan replies, smiling pure and sweet and unashamed. He settles himself against Shane, entirely at ease with his nudity and the mess they’ve made. When Shane's hands lightly curve over the crest of his buttocks and then squeeze, he lets out a sound that’s almost a purr. “I mean. Fuck. You're my boyfriend. My very first boyfriend and it's <em> you</em>. That's fucking <em> insane</em>.”</p><p>Shane smothers a yawn in Ryan’s disheveled hair, then kisses him there. “Tell me about it.”</p><p>“Seriously, though.” Ryan pauses, catching his yawn. “I really do wanna tell you something.”</p><p>“Mmph,” Shane mumbles, tracing patterns down Ryan’s spine with his fingertips. “Is it about the Keddie cabin murders?”</p><p>“No,” Ryan snorts. “It’s a sex thing you’ll probably judge me for, though.”</p><p>“Won’t,” says Shane, halfway into another yawn.  </p><p>But he’s barely awake and Ryan’s mouth gets preoccupied with Shane’s collarbones for a very long time. Shane, lulled by the softness of his tongue and the warm weight of his body, lets it.</p><p>Whatever Ryan was trying to discuss earlier gets lost in the slow onset of sleep.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>The third time, he succeeds</p><p>“A few things.” says Ryan. “If we're gonna do this thing and let it be a thing.”</p><p>Shane is uncaffeinated and lacking filters. “Say thing again.”</p><p>“Thing.” </p><p>Third time's a charm, Shane supposes. They're not in a packed public space and he's not thinking with his dick instead of his brain. Not all of it, anyway. His dick has a tendency to leach away his logic when Ryan turns that solar flare of a smile on him.</p><p>It’s far too early and they're driving to Buzzfeed. Ryan has had a workout and a protein shake and is bouncing with energy. Shane is still waking up, resting his head against the passenger side window. Ryan offers to stop for coffee on the way and that's when it all comes out, in the drive thru lane of a Starbucks.</p><p>“There's some stuff you should know. About me and this...new stuff.”</p><p>“Stuff?”</p><p>“Quit acting like you don’t know what I mean, it’s not gonna win you any Oscars.” Ryan gives him a flat look as he passes him his order. “Like, sexy type stuff that might come up. I know you’re two seconds away from jumping out of the car, but I’m trying to be considerate, not make you uncomfortable, okay?”</p><p>Shane breathes in the scent of his coffee. He’s feeling more awake already, but that could also be his nerves, which are indeed prickling with the impulse to leap out of the car. He takes a slow, careful sip and rests his other hand on Ryan’s thigh. “I’m good. Go on.”</p><p>“I've been trying to hold back so I don’t ruin the mood, but like...that’s not natural for me. I'm probably going to run my mouth.” </p><p>“I'm shocked.” Shane tears a corner off his croissant and offers it to him.</p><p>Ryan glares, but the effect is ruined by the way he sucks Shane's fingers into his plush, pretty mouth. “So yeah, I'm gonna talk, most likely objectify the size and mouthfeel of your dick—”</p><p>“<em>Mouthfeel</em>?”</p><p>“—and say some pretty slutty stuff. If there's anything that kills your boner, let me know and I'll try to avoid it.”</p><p>Shane processes this as they turn onto Santa Monica. “Well. You called me daddy in front of the whole internet and specifically requested not to have that edited out. I think I'm adequately prepared.”</p><p>He's expecting that to get him a titter or two. Instead, there's an unexpected but very significant pause. Ryan’s thigh is very tense under Shane’s palm.</p><p>“Cool, so you already know what to expect and I should just save my breath.”</p><p>“Wait, what?”</p><p>Ryan is a bit pink. “I'm probably gonna say it again and you don't get the option of deciding whether to edit it out of your overgrown brain, so…”</p><p>“Jesus, Ryan.” Shane sets his coffee in a cup holder before he can spill it all over himself. “Why the hell are you telling me this before work?” </p><p>“So I don't spring it on you in the heat of the moment and freak you out,” Ryan explodes, leaving the <em> duh </em> unsaid but layered thickly over his inflection. “Also because it’s been living rent-free in <em> my </em>brain for way too long. Has there ever been a thing you thought you'd be super into if you ever got the chance, but you never got the chance so you didn't actually know for sure?” </p><p>"That," Shane says, "is somehow a very vague and a very specific question."</p><p>"Not as specific as it could be, since I know you were never in a frat full of dudes trying to one-up each other by finding the cheesiest porn and then trying to play it cool when it awakened something in you." </p><p>He’s a little impressed Ryan got all that out in one breath. And a little concerned that he doesn’t seem to have remembered how to breathe at all. Shane has many a quip at the ready about frat life and toxic masculinity and heterosexuality as the default, but he waves them all aside. Ryan’s words from a few nights ago flicker through his memory with a clarity Shane hadn’t possessed at the time.</p><p><em> It’s a </em> <em> sex thing you’ll probably judge me for. </em></p><p>“Hey,” he says gently. “I’m not judging you.”</p><p>Ryan breathes, loudly and alarmingly.</p><p>“If you think you’re into a thing, let’s see if you’re into a thing,” Shane goes on. He’s still trying to wrap his mind about many things involving Ryan; there’s no reason to be anything other than pragmatic. “Actually, I am judging you a little, but that’s mostly on account of your timing. I’m not sure this is the greatest pre-work chat to have, you know?”</p><p>Ryan looks a little abashed. “Yeah, I can see that. But this way you've got some time to think about it, let it sink in, since it’s not like we’ve got much spare time to do the nasty these days anyway.” </p><p>“Oh, I'll be thinking about it all right. It'll be amazing if I get anything done at all.”</p><p>“Thinking in a ‘what the fuck is wrong with Ryan’ kind of way or…?” </p><p>A muscle twitches in Ryan’s jaw. Shane leans over and kisses it. “C’mon, I think that every day anyway.”</p><p>Ryan parks and promptly steals another chunk of his croissant.</p><p>“No,” Shane says. “More like a ‘wow, this is a kink I've never encountered in the wild before and I'm not sure how to handle it yet but I respect you and want to make you happy’ kind of way.”</p><p>“It's kind of weird,” Ryan admits. “I'm a weird guy. We can talk more about this stuff later or you can just be like, ‘that's a no for me, dawg’ and I'll do my best to respect that.”</p><p>He gives Ryan’s hand a squeeze. “It’s a lot to process, yeah. But I never want you to feel like you can't tell me stuff like this. I’ll try to be better about listening.”</p><p>Ryan smirks winningly, which no one should have the ability to do. “Good, because just wait till you hear about all the stuff I <em> want </em> to try. I've got a list.”</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p> </p><p>“Oh.” Shane blinks down at Ryan’s phone. “It’s a list.”</p><p>“I told you,” Ryan says calmly, rummaging through his kitchen drawers for a bottle opener. </p><p>“I guess I didn't think you meant a literal list.”</p><p>Ryan rolls his eyes and presses a beer into his hand. “What else could I possibly mean?”</p><p><em> “I </em> don't know. Something metaphorical.”</p><p>In Shane’s defense, it's been a long week. They've filmed four episodes of Weird And/Or Wonderful World and are in the thick of editing. He barely knows what day it is, just that it’s November and they’re supposed to announce Watcher in less than a month.</p><p>He sinks onto the couch and squints at Ryan’s phone, wondering what the hell all the buildup was about. It’s just a series of bullet points in the Notes app, and not a very long series at that. </p><p>Dirty talk. Blowjobs. Fingering. Shotgunning. Foreskin stuff.</p><p>And then it ends.</p><p>Shane's sex life has historically been rather unadventurous, but this is tame even for him.</p><p>“Foreskin stuff?” he asks. That’s the only thing on this list that’s even remotely novel. Hell, they’ve already ticked off a few of the others. Maybe Ryan’s still adding to it.</p><p>Ryan reappears, a bottle opener in one hand, a successfully opened and already half-downed bottle in the other. “Yeah, I've seen docking porn. That shit looks wild. I've just never gotten to do it because yours is the only other dick I've touched.”</p><p>“You can share your foreskin with me anytime, baby,” Shane promises, flashing him a hokey wink. “Is this seriously all you've got? It's kind of adorable.”</p><p>Ryan launches himself over the back of the couch, managing to land squarely beside Shane without spilling his drink. “You're the only guy I've been with, excuse me for wanting to start out with baby steps before getting into the kinky shit.” </p><p>“So there <em> is </em>kinky shit,” Shane says triumphantly. “Is that on another list?”</p><p>Ryan gives an evasive twitch of his shoulder. “Maybe.”</p><p>“Do I get to see that one too?”</p><p>“Sure.” Ryan pecks him on the cheek. “But not today, you big greedy jerk.”</p><p>“I hope it’s got a little more panache than this one.” Shane passes the remote to him, shaking his head in mock disappointment. “Notes on your phone, seriously?” </p><p>“Everyone keeps notes on their phone, dude. Do you want me to chisel it into stone tablets like Moses?</p><p>“That wasn't Moses, that was the Lord,” Shane says solemnly. “And sure.”</p><p>Ryan flips him off.</p><p>“Can we talk about the first one some more, though?” Shane asks, switching gears. They haven’t ever followed up on Ryan’s drive thru confession and it seems like the kind of thing that really ought to be followed up on.</p><p>“Aw, look who finally wants to talk,” Ryan coos, and promptly pauses Schitt’s Creek. “Right. So. I don’t have much control over what comes out of my mouth when I’m really turned on. It's nothing personal, but I'm probably gonna call you daddy at some point. Probably multiple points.”</p><p>“Nothing personal? <em> How</em>?” </p><p>“Maybe a little personal,” Ryan amends. “You have serious daddy energy. You wear jackets with elbow patches and grow weird mustaches.”</p><p>Shane blinks. “You grew a weird mustache right along with me and you were literally wearing a jean jacket earlier.”</p><p>“Yeah, but I bet you're gonna be the one who keeps embracing the stache way after I get rid of mine!” Ryan protests, with the energy of someone who has anticipated and rebutted this reply many times inside his head. “And don't act like that's the same as running around fucking LA in tweed.”</p><p>Shane can find no evidence to sway his personal jury of one, so he doesn’t try.</p><p>“I’m kind of winging it, to be honest. This isn’t even a kink I knew I had.” Ryan takes a long pull of his drink. “It just feels right with you. The history teacher thing really solidified it.”</p><p>Right. The history teacher thing.</p><p>Ryan gives him an exasperated look, the kind that really should be accompanied by a record scratch and a freeze frame and a “you’re probably wondering how I got here,” possibly uttered in Ryan’s theory voice.</p><p>Despite the lack of helpful cinematic elements, Shane’s mind leaps back to how this all started. </p><p>They were only a couple weeks into September. He’d done a spot as Jazzmyne and Lindsay’s history teacher for the “We Followed a High School Schedule for 24 Hours” video the month before, and Ryan had apparently just gotten around to seeing it. </p><p>Shane hadn’t made the connection at the time, he’d been too busy being thoroughly confused by Ryan plopping down beside him with a huff and declaring, “Just so you know, you’ve ruined my life.” And he’d jammed in his airpods and proceeded to stare blankly at his computer screen as Shane stared blankly at him. </p><p>It had only lasted for a few seconds before Ryan sheepishly turned to him. “I’m not actually mad at you, man, I’m just thinking too much.”</p><p>Even that vague bit of elaboration had seemed to take all the energy out of him, so Shane hadn’t pressed for more. He’d given Ryan space for the rest of the day, spending most of his time with TJ or Katie working on Viper Room post-production. </p><p>He still remembers when even his natural inclination towards conflict avoidance couldn’t handle it anymore. Deliberately skirting Ryan hasn’t been part of his skill set for...pretty much as long as they’ve been friends. He’d wound up flagging Ryan down as he headed for the elevator once they’d finished up for the afternoon.</p><p>Ryan, looking a little tight in the jaw, had held it for him.</p><p>“Hey,” Shane blurted out as casually as he’d been able to. “Sorry about ruining your life. Can you tell me more about how I ruined it?”</p><p>“Oh, I don't know.” Ryan had been eyeballing him and the elevator doors in turn, like he was considering making a break for it the instant they opened. “Maybe by dressing up like a sexy teacher and strutting around in a tie.”</p><p>“I was just supposed to be a normal teacher, man.”</p><p>Ryan had been blushing, Shane remembers that too, and he remembers the second he realized it wasn’t just a trick of the light. “Okay, so maybe I’m the problem here.”</p><p>“I mean it, I’m sorry I ruined your life. Is there any way I can un-ruin it?”</p><p>As they stepped out of the building, Ryan had looked him full in the face, so backlit by the setting sun that Shane could barely make out his features. “I've got an idea that might do both. Just please, please don't kill me for trying it out.” </p><p>Which was how their first kiss (and the second, and the third) had ended up being in the office’s parking lot, in full view of one of the surveillance cameras, which had necessitated a trip to HR the next day. </p><p>And the rest, straight out of a Buzzfeed high school simulation, had been history. </p><p>“Huh,” Shane says, snapping back to the present. “How ’bout that.”</p><p>“Yep.” Ryan sets his empty bottle on the coffee table. “I’m getting another. Should I grab you one?”</p><p>Shane is only a few sips into his own. He nods anyway and watches as Ryan bustles off towards the kitchen, a vision clad in shiny purple shorts and contradictions.</p><p>Ryan has built so much of his brand on being the jittery one, the one who leaps six feet if the wind blows too loudly while Shane laughs it off alongside him. The greater internet population will never know how brave he’s been already, coming to Shane and laying his heart on the line in a way Shane can’t ever imagine doing himself. He never wants Ryan to stop doing that, never wants him to be tongue-tied and hesitant about sharing anything. </p><p>Part of this is because he loves how open Ryan is about his desires, how easily he trusts Shane with the innermost oddities. Another, more selfish part is because Shane knows himself too damn well. Compared to most people, but especially Ryan, he’s kind of awful at communicating. If Ryan keeps setting such a good example, maybe he’ll learn a thing or two. But if Ryan feels like he needs to start holding back, Shane doubts he’ll be able to pick up the slack without tripping all over it. And then everything about them will implode.</p><p>When Ryan sets a bottle in front of him, Shane is ready. He slides an arm around Ryan’s waist, letting Ryan settle into him like a human recliner, which has the added benefit of not forcing them to make eye contact. “Help me understand a little more. Is it a...discipline thing?” he asks cautiously. Shane can’t even discipline his cat, so he desperately hopes this isn’t the case.</p><p>It’s too dim to know for sure, but Ryan gives the impression he’s flushing to the roots of his hair. </p><p>Shane runs his fingers through it, giving him time. “Hey,” he says quietly. “I don’t totally get it, but I want to try. Is it more like a caregiver thing?”</p><p>He feels Ryan melt against him a little more. “I don’t think so,” he says after a moment. “I know I’m into it, but I’m not sure where my brain is trying to go with it yet. I don’t want you to treat me like a kid or anything, I definitely know that. It’s more like…” He screws up his face, clearly trying to grope together enough words to form a straightforward sentence. “It’s more like I want to do stuff that makes you happy.”</p><p>“That sounds more romantic than kinky.”</p><p>“I think I'm subconsciously aiming for something between the two. But seriously, I like what we’ve been doing and I want to do more of it and I don’t want you to have a conniption if I call you daddy.” He darts Shane an uncertain glance. “You won't, will you?”</p><p>“Hard to say,” Shane says honestly. “No one's ever done it before. But if you're into something and I'm into you, there's a pretty good chance I'll be into it too.”</p><p>Now Ryan sounds a bit starstruck. “That was fucking poetry, bro.”</p><p>Shane grimaces. “On a scale of bro to daddy, I’ll take daddy any day.”</p><p>It doesn’t matter how long they’re together, Shane doubts he’ll ever stop getting a burst of euphoria from feeling Ryan’s laugh bubbling through his body before he hears it. </p><p>He smiles into Ryan’s hair and cinches his hold a little tighter.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>A few days later, Shane gets a note.</p><p>It's an index card, one of the large ones.</p><p>On the lined side, in very crooked calligraphy, it reads <em> tit fucking</em>.</p><p>Given that the card is nestled in his underwear drawer, this is either the doing of Ryan or a very dirty-minded house elf.</p><p>“Huh,” Shane says, and chucks a few pairs of boxers into his suitcase. </p><p>They’ve got an early flight to DC for Death Becomes Us in the morning. The plan is for Shane to spend the night at Ryan’s since he lives a bit closer to the airport. He was counting on getting pizza, getting a hand down Ryan’s pants, and getting a good night’s sleep. Leave it to Ryan to sneak another course onto the menu.</p><p>By the time Shane shows up at his door, he must look visibly perplexed because Ryan lights up like a Christmas tree. </p><p>“Cool, you got it!” he chirps, helpfully lugging Shane’s carryon into his room like it weighs nothing.</p><p>“I did.” Shane takes off his shoes, fishes his wallet out of his pocket, and removes the folded-up card before perching on the edge of Ryan’s bed.</p><p>The look on Ryan’s face is somewhere between surprised and impressed. “You’ve been carrying it around with you?”</p><p>“Please don’t try to act like<em> I’m </em> the weird one here,” Shane says mildly, furrowing his brow as he glances between Ryan and the card a few times. Ryan has a great set of pecs on him, but he's not sure this is doable. “Did you mean sucking?” And then, after scrutinizing the words a bit longer: “Since when do you do calligraphy?”</p><p>“I asked Steven for some links. He's into journaling and all that Pinterest kind of stuff.” </p><p>Somehow, this makes perfect sense and no sense whatsoever. Before Shane can respond, Ryan is bounding across the room to his desk. </p><p>“I've been practicing, check it out.” He flops down onto the bed beside him, brandishing something that looks like a coloring book but has <em> Calligraphy for Beginners </em> scripted across the cover. In his other hand is a small, heavy-paged notebook where he appears to have been laboriously copying the alphabet. </p><p>And, a few pages in, there are several attempts to write <em> tit sucking.</em></p><p>Shane is bewildered but impressed. “Whoa.” </p><p>Ryan looks pleased. “You said my sex list needed some more panache. I hope this is panache-y enough for you.”</p><p>He's so ebulliently proud of himself it's practically shimmering in the air around him. </p><p>Shane wants to kiss him, is <em> allowed </em>to kiss him, so he does. </p><p>He wonders if it's always going to be like this, if touching Ryan is always going to give him that leap in his chest like his heart just launched itself off a trampoline. And if it's not always going to be like this, he wonders how much time he has to make the most of it. </p><p>Ryan makes a small, hungry sound into the kiss, so Shane gives him another one for good measure, and to banish the nihilism from his thoughts. </p><p>“Oh, you're nailing it on the panache front,” he reassures Ryan when they part. “I still don't get to see the whole list, though?”</p><p>“Where's the fun in that? Besides, I need more time to practice. I just picked this up a couple days ago and it takes a while to write stuff that looks good.” Guilt flashes across his face. “Also, fine, it originally <em> was </em> tit sucking, but S’s are hella hard for me to write so I just changed it to fucking. Because either one is fine by me, really.”</p><p>Fondness flares up Shane’s middle like a brushfire. Only Ryan. “Giving or getting?”</p><p>“Either one is fine by me,” Ryan repeats, grinning.</p><p>“Okay,” Shane says, sliding his hands up under Ryan's jersey, “So you wanna…Do you want me to actually call them tits?” He cringes inwardly at how uncertain he sounds, the word not quite wanting to leave his tongue.</p><p>Ryan squirms as Shane's hands skim over his nipples and pause there, just lightly cupping his pecs. “Yeah, that's cool, I'm into it.” It seems like a bit of an understatement, judging by the hitch in his voice.</p><p>“Isn’t it great to be on this voyage of discovery together?” he goes on, making Shane snort. “For real, though. There's a lot of stuff I haven’t gotten to do, but I’m pretty sure I’m going to like, you know? I mean, I did get to do this once. The other way around, but still. It was fun.”</p><p>And then he’s smiling that butter cookie of a smile, effortlessly sweet and melt-in-your-mouth glorious. Shane is powerless, he has to lean in to taste it. “Really?” he mumbles, half lost in the heat of Ryan’s mouth. </p><p>“Yeah.” Ryan admits breathlessly. One of his hands has found its way up the back of Shane’s shirt, stroking in tandem with the gentle circles Shane is thumbing against his nipples. “Hooked up with a girl a little after college who let me try it.” </p><p>Shane looks up, surprised. </p><p>“Helen and I were on a break,” Ryan reassures him. “It’s the only time I ever fooled around at work. We were both in the tech lab late and needed to blow off some steam. I didn't have a condom, so we…yeah.”</p><p>Somehow, Shane has made it through the entire duration of their friendship without once trying to imagine Ryan tit-fucking a girl. He hasn’t ever imagined <em> himself </em>doing it. It always seemed like the kind of thing the porn industry made up in order to capitalize on. </p><p>Turns out it doesn’t take much to make him reconsider this. Shane manages it in the time it takes to give a careful pinch to the hard nubs of Ryan’s nipples and kiss the resulting moan right out of his mouth.</p><p>“You want me to push up your slutty little tank top and lick your tits right here?” he says experimentally and watches as Ryan's eyes go dark with arousal. “I can do that. Not sure about the other part though.”</p><p>Ryan shimmies out of his shirt and carefully sets his calligraphy workbook aside. “We don't have to jump into everything right away. You’re doing awesome already.” Then he’s beaming and pulling Shane down on top of him. “Just let it happen organically. We've got plenty of time to figure stuff out.”</p><p>He sounds so sincere and sure of himself, as if there’s already a crystal-clear picture of their future forming in his mind. </p><p>Shane has always known Ryan’s convictions to be strong; after all, most of his internet fame is a byproduct of mocking them. Lately, though, he’s been learning that it’s one thing to be familiar with Ryan’s convictions, but quite another to actually <em> be </em>one of them.</p><p>“C’mere,” Ryan murmurs, and Shane lets himself be drawn down, lets their breaths and bodies intermingle until there’s no space left for doubt to sneak in. </p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>It ends up organically happening once they’re in DC. </p><p>Their show is scheduled for later in the afternoon, which makes it enticingly convenient to go explore a few local watering holes the night before.</p><p>This means punchily requesting entry stamps on both their cheeks instead of their hands. It means swapping sips of each other’s locally brewed hard ciders and stealing kisses behind the bathroom door, so quickly and clumsily their glasses click together. It means loping their way to the rooftop bar and squeezing in to steal warmth from one of the firepits and each other. </p><p>It means Ryan, with his goldenrod hoodie and his face nipped pink from the crisp November air, looking like a cross between a college student and a tipsy autumnal sprite. Shane, by contrast, looks like an overworked adjunct professor—he has indeed maintained his mustache, while Ryan hasn’t. For all his eye-rolling about it, though, Ryan seems to approve. At their third bar of the night, he catches Shane’s eye as he’s surveying them in the mirrored wall behind the bar and gives him a theatrical wink. “Wanna get out of here?”</p><p>“Born ready,” Shane answers instantly. It’s only a slight exaggeration—he’s been ready to collapse into their hotel room since bar number two. Ryan’s eagerness and the novelty of exploring a new city have been carrying him for the past hour or so. </p><p>The carrying power wears off back at the hotel in the most literal sense when Shane stumbles over his own feet getting out of the elevator. </p><p>Ryan, right behind him, reaches out a steadying hand. “Whoa there, daddy, take it easy.”</p><p>It's not at all how Shane imagined this happening. </p><p>He says it so casually it’s almost unremarkable. There’s nothing kinky about it at all; it’s the same intonation Ryan would use if he were calling him dude or big guy. But neither of those have ever made Shane's blood run quite so hot in his veins.</p><p>They’re both a little drunk, but his senses are sharp enough to catch Ryan cagily glancing at him. Trying to gauge his reaction, Shane realizes a bit belatedly. </p><p>The second he’s rebalanced himself, he grips Ryan’s hand tighter and gives him something to gauge. </p><p>Kissing up against the door of their room probably isn’t the most prudent thing to do, but logic escapes Shane when he’s got Ryan’s fingers in his hair, Ryan’s cider-sweet tongue pressing into his mouth. “Oh my fucking god,” Ryan breathes, sounding somewhere between grateful and ridiculously turned on. </p><p>“Yeah,” Shane agrees, and somehow manages to jam his keycard into the door without letting go of Ryan. He could be transforming into a many-limbed cryptid right now and Ryan probably wouldn’t give a shit as long as they didn’t have to stop touching each other. </p><p>The only acceptable reason to separate is stripping, which Ryan starts doing with aplomb before the door swings shut behind them. </p><p>Shane only gets as far as removing his boots before he’s fully absorbed in watching as each bit of skin is exposed. He’s seen Ryan’s body in varying states of undress due to years of working overnights together and Ryan’s laissez-faire attitude towards shirts. This, though, this is still so new, getting to drink in the sight of him unabashedly, knowing he's undressing for him.</p><p>Ryan throws a sock at him. “C’mon, catch up!”</p><p>So Shane does. He sheds his clothes carelessly and Ryan welcomes him into the bed with ease, rewarding him with soft sighs and warm hands and teasing nips of his teeth. It would be enough to have Shane’s knees trembling if he were still standing. </p><p>“Please,” Ryan murmurs. His cock nudges against Shane’s belly, hard and swollen and slick.</p><p>“Okay,” Shane whispers back, ducking to mouth gently at his nipples. “Yeah, okay.”</p><p>They lose themselves in it, the easy sensuality of being pressed skin to skin. Shane’s world narrows down to the lap of his tongue against Ryan’s pebbled nipples, the way Ryan’s voice tangles around Shane’s name as his hands tangle in his hair. </p><p>Ryan’s fingertips map the planes and angles of his body, both hands eventually pausing to clasp his biceps. He gives a little tug. “Come here...get up, get your dick on me.”</p><p>It should sound ridiculous, and it does. But Ryan is watching him with naked want, his mouth parted and his nipples pinked up from Shane’s mouth, and Shane can’t do anything but obey.</p><p>It takes him a little maneuvering. This isn’t something he’s tried before and it feels awkward to be straddling Ryan’s chest, twinges a few muscles he's not used to having twinged, but together they manage to get him situated. Ryan looks like he’s on cloud nine and Shane’s not about to make him leave it. He’s got his arms looped around Shane’s thighs now, keeping him clasped in place with a strange, but not unpleasant, sort of lower-body hug.</p><p>“’S good, really good.” He tightens his hold for a moment, feathering his fingers down the small of Shane’s back like he’s soothing a skittish pet. Shane can feel a blush prickling over his skin, partly from the exposure and partly from how blissed out Ryan sounds already. </p><p>He strokes along Ryan’s bared throat, skirts a spit-damp nipple with his thumb. His cock is an aching length of need in his hand. “Should I, uh…”</p><p>Ryan hums, his eyes sliding shut. “Yeah, fuck yeah. Get your hands on my tits, get your dick between ’em, and have a party.”</p><p>Even though Ryan’s already given him an engraved invitation—well, index card—somehow this is what it takes to spur him into action. He ends up taking the firm swells of Ryan’s pecs in his hands, deliberately grazing both nipples with his fingertips just to experience the way Ryan squirms and sinks his nails into the small of Shane’s back. </p><p>His hands look huge, swallowing up so much of the space on Ryan’s chest. It’s not terribly unlike palming a girl’s breasts, small and tight and responsive. He pushes them together, trying to form a channel to fuck into, causing him and Ryan to draw sharp breaths in unison. There’s something almost animalistic about it, like all he needs is a hole to get off in. </p><p>“Jesus Christ.” Ryan sounds strained. He’s clasping Shane’s thigh with just one arm now. Shane doesn’t need to look, barely needs to register the telltale slick, filthy sounds of it to know that he’s pleasuring himself with the other. “Put it in, come on already.”</p><p>A pulse of equal parts affection and arousal rocks through Shane. He releases one side of Ryan’s chest in order to spit on his hand and slick his cock in slow, easy strokes. He hopes that’s enough; breaking the mood to ask Ryan if they need to lube his chest seems like a horrible idea and he can’t actually remember which one of them packed it. “I’m gonna, just don’t want any weird chafing. You’ll be glad for it afterward.”</p><p>“I’m gonna be glad afterward no matter what,” Ryan tells him, and his eyes are dark pools that flicker open to meet Shane’s without a hint of artifice.   </p><p>His hand slips lower to grip Shane’s ass, spreading him open a bit. Then, so gently, the tease of a fingertip against his hole, slick from stroking himself because Ryan always gets so wet when they’re like this, as if he’s so turned on his body can’t contain it. The shock of it makes Shane buck forward before he’s ready, the head of his cock glancing off the cleft he’s formed of Ryan’s chest. Any other time he’d be going belly up at the prospect of Ryan’s strong fingers fucking into him. He’s hard-pressed not to do it <em> now</em>.</p><p>“As awesome as that feels,” he says, his voice incongruously level, “I need your hands.” </p><p>He takes them, shows Ryan where he needs him. “That’s it, be a good girl and hold your tits together for me. There you go.”</p><p>Ryan’s body spasms alarmingly. “Oh my fucking <em> god</em>.”</p><p>They never actually discussed this sort of name-calling, but it seems to be going over well enough. Shane hooks a giddy grin at him. “Yeah? You like that?” </p><p>“<em>Yeah</em>.” Ryan’s head falls back against the pillow, the barest glint of his eyes visible as he looks up at Shane through his lashes. “Want you to fuck me.” He sounds wanton, a half-feral creature pleading to be filled no matter how. The tendons stand out starkly on the back of his hands, tensed from pushing his pecs together so tightly.</p><p>Shane guides his cock between them and lays his other hand overtop, completing the channel. </p><p>And then he starts to move.</p><p>Ryan makes a hiccupping sound that, in keeping with Ryan’s MO or maybe just with Shane’s Ryan-biased tunnel vision, somehow manages to be attractive. “Fuck, you look so hot right now.”</p><p>Considering Ryan’s vantage point, Shane finds this hard to believe. “What does, the underside of my chin?”</p><p>“What chin?” Ryan asks innocently. </p><p>Shane gives a particularly savage thrust of his hips. </p><p>“I was trying to compliment you,” Ryan protests, never one to drop a conversation just because he’s getting railed. “Learn to take it.”</p><p>“<em> You </em> take it,” Shane mutters, wishing he could contort himself enough to kiss him. </p><p>The arch of Ryan's body is breathtaking. “Yeah, fine, if you insist.”</p><p>He truly does take it beautifully. Shane watches his face, held mesmerized by the electric energy sparking between them, by the scent of sex that makes him want to rub himself all over Ryan like a cat until they drench each other in pheromones. With each thrust, the tip of his cock peeks out from between Ryan’s tits, the shaft of it rubbing spit-slippery and hot against his palm. </p><p>Ryan is gasping a steady litany of <em> fuck </em> and <em> oh god </em> and various other half-audible entreaties. Shane almost misses it when it comes out, but then it registers like a shot from a pellet gun, a glaucoma burst, the minute explosion of a popcorn kernel. </p><p>
  <em> “So fucking good, daddy, don’t stop."</em>
</p><p>Barely a whisper, but with a heat that smolders it into Shane’s memory. </p><p>He doesn’t expect the way that makes his jaw go slack and lust-stupid, the way everything seems to dissolve into a blur of static aside from the exquisite clench of Ryan holding his tits together for him, giving him a tight, welcoming space to come.</p><p>Ryan is rarely shy about his body and he’s rapidly becoming less shy with his words. Shane’s still working on both of these, but he gets to reap all the benefits of Ryan’s example, including the unconscious urge to follow his lead, to force himself out of his own head and into the moment. And so, even though there are a hundred quips he could make right now, little jabs to prove to Ryan how very much he is <em> not </em>having a kink-borne conniption, all that comes out instead is a whimper.</p><p>Shane has never been a whimperer. For Ryan, he’s open to becoming just about anything.</p><p>Under him, Ryan is curving his back off the bed. There’s a wicked little grin on his face. “That’s it, daddy, you gonna come all over me?”</p><p>“<em>Yeah</em>.” Shane can feel his toes curling, his thighs straining, the steady shift of Ryan’s hips under him where his cock must be aching to be touched. “Yeah, sweetheart, you’ve got me so close.” He swallows, gulps down a dizzying breath, lets the words rush out of him before he has a chance to hesitate. “That’s my good girl, holding so tight for me.”</p><p>Ryan gazes up at him like he’s on the verge of being destroyed, like Shane could wreck him six ways to Sunday and he’d love every moment of it. His tongue is resting just behind his bottom lip as if he can tell Shane’s about to come and he’s just that desperate to taste some of it. “<em>Please</em>, daddy.” </p><p>Shane’s spine buckles. </p><p>He catches a glimpse of Ryan, collapsing back with a moan as Shane streaks his chest and throat with come, and then the world goes fleetingly, fantastically white. </p><p>Ryan steadies him through it. He must be desperate to touch himself, but he keeps those clever hands on Shane—running gentle palms along his thighs, stroking up his flanks, winding both arms around his hips again. </p><p>“Come here, dude. You’re too top-heavy, that big old skull is gonna tip you over.”</p><p>“I’m dude again now?” Shane asks, toppling into a jelly-legged sprawl alongside him. “That was quick.”</p><p>“Yep,” Ryan says, far too cheeky for someone who’s started jerking himself off. “Now be a good dude and abide.”</p><p>“Make me,” Shane mutters, and slips a hand down to join Ryan’s around his cock.</p><p>He’s beautiful, writhing into their combined touch with his hair spiked with sweat, nipples reddened from where he’s been pinching them even though they must already be sore. Shane makes it his personal mission to get his mouth all over them, to soothe Ryan's roughness away by lavishing them with licks and kisses.</p><p>“You cleaning me up like that?” Ryan asks, voice taut and trembly as a bowstring. Shane feels a powerful rush of something he can’t name, something that sends him sky-high with pride that he’s the one who’s made Ryan sound like that. “<em>Fuck</em>, you are.” </p><p>“Gotta take care of my girl,” he murmurs, and goes right back to licking his come from Ryan’s skin.  </p><p>All the while, he’s running a mental replay of the moment it happened for the first time, of Ryan saying daddy like he would say a prayer, hushed and reverent. Shane laps the come from his skin as he strokes him. </p><p>Ryan’s belly tenses up tight under his mouth, fingers clutching tighter still in Shane’s hair, and he comes over their clasped hands.</p><p>Shane gives one last soft suck to each of his nipples before moving up to kiss him.</p><p>Ryan makes a half-formed sound of displeasure that morphs into a contented sigh when Shane brings his come-smeared hand up to toy with his nipples again. Shane can feel his eyebrows trying their best to burrow into his hairline. “Wow. You love this.”</p><p>“Wish you did too,” Ryan says wistfully, his breath wafting warm along Shane’s jaw. “It feels awesome.” </p><p>He brushes a touch across Shane's nipples to illustrate his point. They aren't especially sensitive, but it feels nice and watching Ryan sink against him to press kisses along his chest is even nicer. Learning the differences between their bodies is fascinating for Ryan. He’s always been intrigued by what makes Shane tick and this is a whole new dimension to explore.</p><p>He cocks his head and opens his arms, and Shane moves right into the space that’s been made for him. This is one particular dimension they’ve explored thoroughly, their shared penchant for entangling themselves. Even after the most grueling workdays, they at least had the wherewithal to get that far.</p><p>Shane squirms in closer, Ryan's stomach giving a ticklish leap as he trails his fingers through the come there. “Messy boy,” he observes through a smothered yawn that masks most of his tentativeness. He’s not like Ryan, so candid about the things he likes to say. Shane is still trying to find his feet in the world of pet names that are both permissible and willing to roll off his tongue. </p><p>Ryan gives him an impish smile and a few more epithets come to mind. “Always. Or...sometimes,” he amends. “Kind of into being your messy girl too, I’m not picky.” </p><p>Shane buries his smile in Ryan’s neck. </p><p>For a long time, he lets himself drift in the scent of his sweat, the stroke of Ryan’s hand over his spine, urging him to curl his body into him even more as if Shane is someone small and vulnerable. Ryan’s fingers comb their way through his head and he tips his head into the caress, forgetting everything but the pleasure of being held. </p><p>“Fuck,” Ryan sighs, when Shane eventually comes up for air and to plant a kiss on his unstamped cheek. “We’ve gotta do a show in front of a whole-ass live audience tomorrow. Can we just stay in bed all day?”</p><p>“Our whole-ass fans will love that,” Shane deadpans. “Besides, it should be easy as pie compared to the show you just gave me.” </p><p>Ryan sits bolt upright.</p><p>Shane resents this for all of two seconds, when Ryan blurts out, “Oh my god, <em> pie</em>.”</p><p>Ryan might be a genius.</p><p>As it turns out, Dangerously Delicious is both open late and a veritable pie heaven. And if anyone spots a couple of ghost hunters popping out of their hotel to pick up their Doordash order, even though they’ve got postcoital written all over them, no one can prove they’re doing anything but supporting local businesses. </p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>The next index card Shane finds is in his silverware drawer a week later, taped to an envelope containing the pristine results of an STI panel—his own. They'd had them sent to each other back when they carved out enough time for a trip to Kaiser. He’s got Ryan’s lying around somewhere.</p><p>A single word twinkles back at him.</p><p><em> Barebacking</em>.</p><p>There's a little flourish drawn underneath it in coppery ink.</p><p>Shane’s mouth is suddenly very dry.</p><p>Ryan is on the living room couch responding to work emails. There’s a half-finished smoothie in front of him that he’s ignoring since he dropped the straw on the floor and asked Shane to grab him another. </p><p>Ryan knows full well that Shane keeps a few metal straws in his silverware drawer.</p><p>Ryan, Shane decides for approximately the thousandth time, is a devious little shit.</p><p>Wordlessly, he holds up the card.</p><p>His face must be speaking volumes because Ryan looks up and winces. “Oh. Not your thing?”</p><p>“Didn't say that,” Shane says thickly, tongue feeling clumsy in his mouth as he sinks down beside him.</p><p>Ryan brightens, leaping immediately from one extreme to the other. “Really? Cool, I got myself ready in case you want to try it tonight.”</p><p>Very deliberately, Shane reaches between them and clicks his laptop shut. “Please, <em> please </em>don’t tell me you asked Steven Lim for resources again.”</p><p>“Why not? You don't think the guy who carries a protractor set around also carries a few emergency enemas?”</p><p>Shane stares.</p><p>“<em>Kidding</em>. Jesus.” </p><p>Shane is never going to stop being a little awed and a little envious at Ryan’s ability to do bisexuality better than him. Deep down, he knows there’s no such thing, but he can’t help making the comparison anyway. Ryan is taking to his sexual awakening with more self-assuredness in a few months than Shane managed to cultivate within a few years. </p><p>Is <em> still </em>trying to cultivate, if he’s honest.  </p><p>Current case in point: Ryan shifting over to straddle him on the sofa and saying, with perfect tranquility, “We don’t have to. Just putting it out there, you can totally raw me if you want to. The tests say we're both safe and you’re kind of a,” he pauses, grasping for just the right word, “comeslut.”</p><p>“Thank you,” Shane says blandly, denying nothing.</p><p>“Or,” Ryan says thoughtfully. “do you want it to be you?” </p><p>Shane’s eyes flicker half-closed for a moment.</p><p>“Ohhhh.” Ryan claims not to be a cat person, but he can practically purr when the mood is upon him. The rock of his hips against Shane’s lap suggests the mood is very much upon him. “Is that it? You want me to fuck you bare, daddy?” </p><p>Ryan drives him absolutely insane sometimes, and dating him has caused those times to blossom like a multifoliate rose. But there are other times when Ryan stumbles across his soft spots and knows to treat them with caution instead of immediately poking at them. There are times when Ryan can break him down with just a glance.</p><p>He has to fight not to cover his face. Ryan somehow senses the urge and gently grips his wrists when Shane’s hands give a twitch between them. “Hey, no, it’s okay.” And Ryan is kissing him, drawing his hands down, guiding Shane to put them on him instead.</p><p>Ryan bends into him, nuzzling his prickly cheek against Shane’s neck. “Can I be inside you like that? Please?” </p><p>Smooth-voiced and shameless, so enviably unselfconscious. He sucks Shane’s earlobe into the soft scorch of his mouth before Shane has a chance to respond.</p><p>To be fair, Shane considers just remembering to breathe quite an admirable response at the moment.</p><p>Ryan is the living embodiment of charisma. It's kind of a problem. He can be sleep-deprived to the point of delirium, wearing a ragged high school film club t-shirt, and then he’ll flash Shane a look and suddenly freeze-frame with THIS GUY FUCKS superimposing itself over his head in sparkly letters. </p><p>That’s what it feels like to date Ryan most of the time. Even when he’s making Shane want to tear his hair out for some reason or other, Shane is constantly just a little dazzled. By him, by the fact that this thing between them has somehow taken wing, and by just how badly he wants to keep it in the air. </p><p>“Yes,” Shane admits. </p><p>Ryan squeezes his hand. “Cool.”</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>The first time Ryan rubbed a finger against him, just some added stimulation to make him come, Shane’s body had practically liquified on the spot. </p><p>It was a pivotal experience. Ryan realized just how weak Shane was for having his ass played with and Shane realized that he'd just delivered that weakness right into Ryan's very capable hands.</p><p>Ryan had been beyond elated. He took his sweet time, teasing Shane’s hole with the barest little brushes of his fingertip for a small eternity, and making soft sounds of wonder each time Shane’s hips bucked against him. But he hadn’t pressed it inside him, no matter how much Shane squirmed and gasped for him. </p><p>At the time, Shane had been willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. As much as he'd fantasized about taking Ryan’s fingers, and then some, he could graciously allow Ryan to take it slow for the first time. The last thing he wanted to do was spook the hitherto straight guy, whom he knew for a fact to be very spookable. </p><p>He wasn’t planning to beg. But somehow a wrung-out, shameless <em> please </em> had eked its way past Shane’s lips and then they were being rewarded with Ryan’s lips and Ryan had finally, <em> finally </em>eased a finger inside him. </p><p>It happened again the first time Ryan fucked him. They’d tried it with Shane on his back, at Ryan’s too-casual-to-be-anything-but-romantic request, and Ryan had slipped right out of him multiple times while trying to set a rhythm. Later, Shane would wonder if it was all due to nerves and inexperience or if he’d done it on purpose to get a reaction out of him. Which he had—after the third or fourth mishap, Shane had had to turn over and present himself like an animal in heat. He’d been sweat-drenched and desperate and hadn’t had enough functioning brain cells to be worried about spooking Ryan by asking for what he wanted this time.</p><p>Shane doesn’t remember much about what he said, just that it was something along the lines of <em> fuck, please, do it like this, I need it</em>. Something half-snarled and half-sobbed that he would be privately embarrassed about later. But in the moment, it got him exactly what he needed: Ryan kissing his back and taking him from behind, so thick and deep and strong, making a plea burst from Shane’s lungs with every thrust. </p><p>That was when it dawned on Shane that Ryan had served up a weakness of his own. </p><p>The thought of Ryan fucking him bare is almost too much to process. He doesn’t know what might come out of his mouth, but he’s banking on Ryan getting all riled up about it. </p><p>When it happens, they’re failing completely at watching the Twilight Zone reboot in Ryan’s bed. Shane is already a little drunk on Ryan’s touches and warmth and his soft, hot tongue dipping into his mouth. </p><p>“I might’ve pencilled something into my calendar for tonight,” Shane says casually. “If you're up for it.”</p><p>Ryan looks up from where he’s been trailing fingers under the hem of Shane’s t-shirt. “You’re not teaching me how to play D&amp;D.”</p><p>To be fair, Shane has been trying to entice Ryan into broadening his gaming horizons. But still.</p><p>“Do you seriously think my situational awareness is that bad?” Shane demands. “Things are getting hot and heavy, so I bring it all to a screeching halt to explain how to roll for initiative?”</p><p>Ryan looks contemplative. “I mean, I’d roll <em> you </em>for initiative.”</p><p>“That’s what I’m hoping for.” </p><p>It takes a moment for Ryan to parse that, so Shane waggles his eyebrows to really drive home the point.</p><p>"You’ll let me do that for you?" His phrasing makes it sound like Shane’s bestowing some great honor on him. For a second, Shane is so bowled over with affection he can’t do anything but grin.</p><p>“Yeah. Come on and give me a long, dirty roll.”</p><p>“No more dice metaphors.” Ryan vaults on top of him, pinning Shane’s hips with his hands and his face with a suddenly serious look. “Say it for real. I need to hear it.”</p><p>Shane swallows. He tries to push his body into an arch, but Ryan has a good hold on him. Shane squirms again, just to watch the flex of his arms, and blurts it out: “I want you to fuck me without a condom.”</p><p>And just like that, Ryan releases him and brings Shane’s knuckles to his lips as if he's swearing fealty. “Okay. You sure?” </p><p>Shane doesn’t skip a beat this time. “Jesus, yes. <em> Please</em>.”</p><p>That makes Ryan’s gaze go a little more heated, a little more heavy. “Then let’s get you ready, big guy.”</p><p>Ryan is always thorough about preparation, whatever the occasion. It doesn’t matter if it’s losing sleep over pre-production, packing a helmet for protection against Bigfoot, or visiting half a dozen churches to score some holy water. Most of the time, Shane appreciates that about him very much. </p><p>There are some exceptions, though. It turns out one of them is watching Ryan spend at least a decade lubing up his fingers, then using them to give his cock a few strokes instead of putting them elsewhere. He’s gorgeous, sprawled naked and indolent across the bed, luxuriating in his own touch. It’s just that Shane’s in a state of mild agony.</p><p>“So, uh, the view is great but can you finger me already?”</p><p>The grin spreading across Ryan’s face is equal parts devilish and delighted. “Aww, why didn’t you say so?”</p><p>And before Shane can reply to that, he positions his finger above the seam of Shane’s ass and draws it down slowly. </p><p>It makes Shane’s vision blur for a moment when he presses it in. He must utter some sort of noise because Ryan is kissing up his spine in an instant, stroking his thighs apart with his other hand. “There you go, daddy, that’s it. Is that what you need?”  </p><p>Another finger inside, searching and finding, working in gentle pushes. </p><p>Ryan’s mouth is parted over the crest of Shane’s shoulder now, smearing messy kisses there. Mouth slack, fingers smothered in the smooth, hot clench of Shane’s body. Shane happened upon him watching a video about prostate stimulation once and, knowing Ryan, he didn’t stop there. The tiny bundle of nerves sparks with sensation as he moves, seeking, fingering him as he laps the salt from his skin.</p><p>“You’re so tight,” Ryan whimpers, working a third finger into him, all the way up to the base. Breath hitching wetly like he’s the one being worked open. “You gonna open up for me?”</p><p>Shane can barely speak. “Please, yeah, I’m ready, I can take it.” The rub of Ryan’s cock against his ass is exquisite. Hard and thick, leaking precome all over him with each roll of his hips, it practically makes Shane’s mouth water to taste him. He loves sucking Ryan off—loves getting to feel the girth of Ryan’s dick stretching his lips wide, getting to swallow him so deep it makes his jaw ache the next day—and he’d do it in a heartbeat if it were physically possible for Ryan to fuck him from both ends at once.</p><p>Ryan hums a laugh into his skin, because apparently Shane’s agony means nothing to him. “Ready for what?” </p><p>Shane groans. “The next stock market crash, Jesus, what do you <em> think</em>?”</p><p>“Nice try.” Ryan goes right on kissing his nape, nuzzling his nose into Shane’s sweat-damp hair. “I want to give you everything. But you’ve gotta tell me what you need before I give it to you.”</p><p>There’s a little catch in his voice. For a fleeting moment, Shane trembles like a leaf.</p><p>“<em>Fine</em>. Get your big dumb dick inside me and fuck me raw.”</p><p>“I thought romance was dead, but you just resurrected it and killed it all over again,” Ryan sighs.</p><p>But he does, in fact, comply.</p><p>“Oh,” Shane says, “<em>fuck</em>.”</p><p>Ryan eases himself in deeper, hot and bare and filthy. There’s a moan building on the back of Shane’s tongue, one that Ryan laps right out of him when he cranes forward to steal a kiss.</p><p>He has a hand on Shane’s throat, guiding him to tilt his head back, and Shane goes without thought. He gets a flutter in his chest the way he always does when Ryan kisses him, like riffling the pages of a flipbook. His Adam’s apple bobs between Ryan’s fingers when he swallows and Shane just tilts further into his touch. He’d let Ryan twist him into whatever position he wanted. He’d let Ryan squeeze the air out of him and trust him to know exactly when to let go.  </p><p>“You feel so fucking good, holy shit,” Ryan murmurs, voice gone heavy and honeyed against Shane’s cheek. He strokes Shane’s throat, like he’s trying to loosen all the words Shane keeps jammed inside it, and then lets himself stroke lower still.</p><p>Ryan thrusts a little deeper, working himself fully inside by achingly slow increments. Shane’s knees struggle to spread wider, his hand clumsily guiding Ryan’s over his cock. </p><p>"Yeah?” Ryan is barely audible over the roar of his own pulse. “Is this okay?" </p><p>“<em>Please</em>,” Shane whispers. “Don’t stop.”</p><p>“Not gonna,” Ryan says, his breath hot on Shane’s jaw. </p><p>And he doesn’t. The only thing in the world that matters is Ryan. Ryan around him and inside him, Ryan mouthing at his nape and whispering filth like it’s his mother tongue, like it’s poetry. Telling him that he's taking him so perfectly, that he feels so incredible, so hot inside. Kissing up his spine and making lewd promises between each vertebrae.</p><p>“I got you, daddy, I’m gonna take care of you.” Another butterfly brush of Ryan’s lips. “Gonna fill you up so much you’re dripping. ”</p><p>Shane chokes on a moan. He reaches blindly behind himself to grab the meat of Ryan's ass, forcing him deeper.</p><p>He’s already fucking Shane hard enough that the slap of his balls against his ass is borderline mortifying. Ryan’s hips roll as if they’ve been tuned up and oiled specifically for that purpose, for fucking him and filling him so the breath rattles out of his body on every thrust. All the while, he’s still trying his damndest to help Shane jerk himself off, face hot where he’s tucked it against the join of Shane’s shoulder. </p><p>Shane is holding Ryan as close to him as he physically can without straining something, guiding their bodies together. Face down, ass up, beyond shame, beyond anything but the vibration of Ryan’s whimper against his skin and the way Ryan is shaking against him, his mouth all hot and open against the side of Shane's neck, breath hitching like he's about to fall apart. </p><p>He just might be.</p><p>"Are you close?” Shane asks.</p><p>For the first time, Ryan’s rhythm falters. “<em>Yeah</em>.”</p><p>“You can come, it's okay.” </p><p>He feels Ryan give another jolt, like this is some kind of revelation. “You sure?”</p><p>If they were face to face, Shane would be giving him the mother of all are-you-kidding looks. “<em>Ryan</em>. That’s kind of the objective here. Come in me."</p><p>“Right,” Ryan acknowledges. “Right, okay.” His thumb finds its way between Shane’s ass cheeks, rubbing gently where he’s stretched around him. “I've never gotten to do this to anyone before. I'm glad it gets to be you.” </p><p>Shane is suddenly very thankful that Ryan can't see his face.</p><p>Some of it must be confirmation bias, but he swears he can feel the flex of Ryan’s cock inside him when he comes, the hot pulse of him spilling deep. Shane can't help crying out, muffled against the pillow. </p><p>Ever tenacious, Ryan finds his release and immediately chases down Shane’s. He slides out of him and tips Shane onto his side in one smooth movement, getting a hand around his dick before Shane has a chance to do it himself. He likes this position, Shane’s noticed, maybe a holdover from being the big spoon with all the girls he’s dated, maybe because it’s one of the most foolproof ways to jerk another guy off no matter how new you are to it. </p><p>Ryan works him over like he’s not at all new to it. </p><p>He thumbs under the head of Shane’s dick, feathers the tease of a fingernail along his slit. By the time he wraps his hand around him, Shane is already gone. When he comes, it’s with a plea on his lips and Ryan softly urging, "That's it, daddy, let me feel you."</p><p>Afterward, he’s not aware of much. The ache of well-worked muscles. The desperate need for a shower. And Ryan, unrepentant cuddler, bundling Shane against his chest in a sweaty, sticky embrace.</p><p>“We’ve gotta clean you up,” Ryan muses. Their breaths have evened out and his fingers are combing lazily through Shane’s hair. Shane tries not to think too hard about where they’ve been. “If you fall asleep like this, you’ll be pissed when you wake up. Probably at me for letting you sleep, come to think of it. And if you’re pissed at me, you’ll have bad associations with getting rawed and probably won’t want to do it again.”</p><p>Shane snorts. “Is this some adults-only If You Give A Mouse A Cookie book?”</p><p>“I’m just saying!” Ryan sits up, unceremoniously dislodging Shane. “That was one of the hottest things that’s ever happened to me.”</p><p>He shimmies down the bed to brush a kiss against Shane’s inner thigh. Shane has a powerful impulse to primly draw his knees together, which is hilarious, all things considered. “I mean it.” Ryan nuzzles a few more kisses up his thigh, pinking up the skin with his scruff. “You were amazing.”</p><p>“Okay!” Shane squawks. “I’m gonna shower, just...stop calling me things.”</p><p>“Nope,” Ryan says cheerfully. “I mean, definitely shower, yeah. But you’re gonna let me compliment you and you’re gonna like it.”</p><p>“I didn’t get the index card about that kink,” Shane quips.</p><p>“Dude. It’s not about that.” </p><p>“I’m pretty sure it is.”</p><p>Ryan looks like he’s got a few more things to say on the subject, but he straightens his spine and gives Shane a sideways look. “You know what, I’m not going to argue with you while you’ve got my jizz leaking out of you.”</p><p>“Oh my <em> god</em>,” Shane mutters, and flees.</p><p>
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</p><hr/><p> </p><p>Ryan's calligraphy has improved greatly by the time the next card surfaces, this time under Shane's glasses case. </p><p>In lovely swirling script, it reads <em> eat you out</em>.</p><p>Shane slides his glasses on and reads it again.</p><p>Then he texts Ryan. </p><p>
  <em> You free at all this weekend? </em>
</p><p>The weekend finds him supine in his bed with Ryan’s cock thick and bare between his ass cheeks.</p><p>This is becoming a pattern he could definitely get used to.</p><p>Ryan is very infuriatingly <em> not </em>fucking him this time. Ryan is milking the precome from his dick and letting it leak along the cleft of Shane’s ass like some demented pornographic version of water torture. </p><p>At this point, Shane’s willing to sell his soul just to feel Ryan’s cock inside him. He squirms, trying to find the leverage to part his thighs, but Ryan has a hand clamped on his ankles where he’s got them hefted over one shoulder. It’s not the most logical position to be in, all things considered, but it allows for two of Ryan’s favorite things: kissing and tormenting Shane. </p><p>“<em>Ryan,</em>” he says plaintively. “Please fuck me?” He manages to make eye contact with him the whole time, which seems pretty commendable since he has absolutely no dignity left. </p><p>His body is already past the point of no return, gone lewd and selfish for it. He can feel his hole twitching open, spasming greedily to be filled. The trickle of precome slicking over it is enough to make him bite his lip, a devastating precursor to the main event. </p><p>But Ryan doesn’t give it to him. Ryan just kisses his jaw and keeps rutting against him in the same steady rhythm. Bearing down on him, keeping Shane practically bent in half as he croons muffled admonishments into his throat. </p><p>“Uh-uh. Not this time, daddy. ’M gonna get you all wet first, then take my time getting you clean. Let me do that for you?” </p><p>Ryan has a habit of making it sound like Shane’s doing him a favor by allowing himself to be debauched. It’s very persuasive. Usually.</p><p>“You can do that by fucking me,” Shane points out through gritted teeth.</p><p>Ryan grits his right back at him, sharklike. “Yeah, but this is more fun.” </p><p>“It’s not <em> enough</em>,” Shane protests, hoping those three words convey just how badly he wants Ryan inside him, wants that hot bare cock stretching him open and forcing the breath out of him. Ryan always runs so hot, like all that California sunshine he’s drunk in has taken up residence under his skin. Shane has a theory this is why he walks around shirtless so often. It’s either a lifetime’s surplus of sunshine intake or it’s specifically to get a rise out of Shane. Then again, almost everything Ryan does manages to get a rise out of Shane. </p><p>And then he dials it back, looking at him all concerned and earnest with his bangs in his eyes. “I’ll stop if you don't like it. I just want to try this.” </p><p>“I like it.” Shane sinks both hands into the mussed mop of his hair and kisses him, smoothing the doubt from his tongue by stroking it with his own. Shane can feel the thick, swollen head of his cock pressing against his hole, precome drooling out of him like its own obscene kind of kiss. “You don’t have to stop, sweetheart, I promise.”  </p><p>“If there’s ever something you don’t—” </p><p>Shane pushes his hair back and kisses him again. “I like everything you do to me.”</p><p>Ryan makes a small, shocked sound and comes in sudden streaks of heat between them. </p><p>“Two questions,” Shane says after he’s processed this. “Did you just make one of your weird swoony noises when you came?” </p><p>Ryan laughs, a breathless burst of pure joy. “Maybe?”</p><p>Shane wraps Ryan in his limbs the second he lets Shane’s legs drop back down to the bed. “You’re such a dork.”</p><p>“What was the second question?” Ryan prompts. </p><p>“Oh.” Shane slides a hand down to Ryan’s cock, unable to hold back a disappointed sigh at the feel of it going soft and pliant. “Will you fuck me if I get you hard again?”</p><p>He sounds embarrassingly desperate, but ever since Ryan cheerfully called him a comeslut, that cat’s been out of the bag. Shane curves a leg over Ryan’s hip, letting him take in the mess he’s made of him. “Please?” Ryan’s a firecracker, his refractory period is straight out of the frat house, and Shane’s learned how to fan the flames like a pro. They could do it.</p><p>But Ryan is already shaking his head and guiding him to lie back down. “Not this time, daddy,” he says again. There’s a gentle finality to it. </p><p>“I’m not making this easy for you, I know, but you’re being so good for me.” Ryan kisses his hip bone, the tip of his cock, nudging his way lower. Shane can feel his body blooming all over with a flush, wanting to bask in Ryan’s praises and hide from them at the same time. </p><p>“You really want me in you like that, hm?” Ryan murmurs. The first tentative lap of his hot little tongue against his hole makes Shane cry out. It’s too much to take in. The urgency throbbing in his every nerve ending, the breathtaking shift of Ryan’s back muscles, the way he cups his hands around Shane’s thighs as if he’s cupping his face before guiding him into a kiss.</p><p>He almost misses Ryan’s next words.</p><p>“You want me coming inside you, don’t you, making you a daddy for real.”</p><p>The air crackles.</p><p>It takes a moment for Shane to realize it’s the hiss of his own indrawn breath, spiking hard through his teeth. His belly clenches, cock still very much rock-hard against it. Arousal somersaults through his stomach and he can’t even begin to explain why. “<em>Ryan</em>, Jesus Christ.”</p><p>Ryan is watching him with a guarded gaze.</p><p>Shane can barely breathe, but he nods, a little stunned by himself. “Go on.”</p><p>Ryan's eyes are practically all pupil, his voice rushed and reverent. “You'd let me do that?”</p><p>“I’d let you do just about anything to me,” Shane says truthfully. </p><p>His cock twitches as soon as he touches it and Ryan is on him in an instant. Jerking him with slow, sure strokes. Kissing over the arch of his ribs. Teasing his tongue inside the dip of his navel. When he lifts his head, the look in his eyes is somewhere between lust and wariness. </p><p>“That what you want me to do, daddy? Fuck you till this skinny little tummy is nice and big?” </p><p>His voice wavers in the middle of the sentence, vulnerable in a way that makes Shane want to melt into his arms. </p><p>On an impulse, he surges up to crush Ryan against him. “Yeah...<em>yes</em>. Want you to—” Each breath snags on a moan and his nose is mashed against Ryan’s cheekbone, but judging by the tremor that runs through Ryan’s body he’s getting the message loud and clear. He nips Ryan’s ear, lets him feel the heat of every word he breathes into it. “Get me knocked up, fucking <em> do </em>it.”</p><p>“Oh my fucking god,” Ryan mutters, breaking character long enough to shake his head in disbelief. </p><p>Only for an instant, then his eyes are back on Shane, hooded and dark with promise. Committing to the bit. “Gonna eat you out this time, but next time...just gonna come in you like you’ve been begging me to all night. Until everyone's gonna be able to look at you and know what I did to you.”</p><p>He rolls Shane onto his stomach like he weighs nothing and together they wrestle a pillow under his hips. Ryan’s mouth lingers at his nape, voice dropping lower still. “Until everyone knows I've been rawing your pretty little cunt.” </p><p>His hand slips around to stroke Shane's belly, circling slow and gentle, as if there's something precious inside.</p><p>Shane almost chokes on his own tongue.</p><p>There’s no way in hell he’s going to last. He’s still recovering when Ryan’s mouth occupies itself with pastimes other than words—he sucks a bruising kiss into the small of Shane’s back, palms his ass open, and gets to work. </p><p>Ryan is meticulous about cleaning his come from Shane’s skin. He nudges his tongue against his rim, almost delicately at first, soothing his hole with soft little laps that go on for ages. By the time the tip of his tongue gently enters him, Shane is trying not to choke on the pillowcase. </p><p>And Ryan just keeps at it, making hungry, humming sounds as he licks him out nice and slow. Fingertips holding him spread wide, each quicksilver dart of his tongue sending a pulse of need straight to Shane’s cock. He’s so hard that his balls ache with the need to come, cock flushed and heavy between his thighs. Both his hands are clutched in a death grip on the pillowcase.</p><p>When Ryan wedges a hand under Shane’s hips to thumb the swollen head of his dick, it’s all over. He utters a throaty, hungry sound that resonates up Shane’s spine and Shane comes hard, shaking with spasms that contract around that velvety, relentless tongue.</p><p>“That was...unexpected,” Shane says afterward.</p><p>Ryan grunts, not moving. “Sure was.”</p><p>“Didn't mind it, though.”</p><p>Ryan’s eyes flicker open. “Same.”</p><p>“Huh.”</p><p>“Yeah.” </p><p>They exchange wry glances in perfect unison. If that isn’t their relationship in a nutshell, Shane doesn’t know what is.</p><p>And that’s that. Their usual post-sex rituals play out like clockwork. Shane wipes them down, then grumbles that he's cold. Ryan grabs him some pajama pants, then insists they order takeout.  He delegates this task to Shane, then bounds past him into the bathroom.</p><p>From the threshold, Shane skims through their dinner options on his phone. “There’s this new Mongolian place, but I don’t know...” </p><p>He holds the rest of that thought until Ryan is in the midst of swirling around a mouthful of Listerine.</p><p>“...it might not be good for the baby.”</p><p>Ryan makes him clean the bathroom, but it’s worth it.</p><p>
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</p><hr/><p> </p><p>After they announce Watcher to the world, it's like the internet explodes. </p><p>The past several months have been a sustained whirlwind of all the intricacies that go into covertly building a company. Shane has to admit he’s impressed they’ve managed to pull it off. Like a chess game they’ve been playing against a universe that doesn’t know it yet. A universe that could checkmate them flat on their asses at any time. </p><p>But for now, at least, everything’s coming up Watcher.</p><p>All they’ve done is drop a trailer and plug the hell out of it on social media, but the impact is instantaneous.</p><p>It's as exhilarating as it is exhausting. Getting to share a sliver of all the ideas they've been incubating. Getting to see the steady uptick of views, likes, and reactions once the trailer goes public. From the wild comments about whether this means an end to Worth It and Unsolved—they quickly realize they should have made this much clearer much sooner—to the hokey promo photos of them all gussied up and gawking at an old fashioned TV bearing the Watcher logo, it all kindles a stunned surge of pride that lights up their claustrophobic short-term office nonstop. </p><p>This is the summation of anxiously munching all those cheese balls in Ryan’s kitchen over late nights. Of Steven trying to explain the best way to survive pitch meetings with investors. Of Ryan filling sandbags with gravel with nothing but gumption and two tickets to the gun show just to save less than ten dollars. Of pulling together an amazing little production team with nothing but a wing and a prayer and a promise of possibility. </p><p>Yeah, Shane figures, they’ve earned the right to a little pride.</p><p>Vlogging the Watcher-making process is Ryan’s idea, albeit one that has Steven going pink with indignation because he says <em> he </em>pitched it six months ago.</p><p>They’ve got exactly one month left before launch, but they’ve filmed bigger projects in much less time. They also, Shane dares to think, have mostly gotten their shit together by this point. Any sooner and all the footage would have been a series of them all struggling to understand everything from how to make a corporate bank account to how to file for bankruptcy (just in case). And as much as Shane enjoys thumbing his nose at Buzzfeed, he can’t ignore the fact that it essentially sheltered them from all the nitty-gritty business stuff.  </p><p>Ryan insists on interviewing them for this. There’s only so much footage he can get by filming a tour of their office, no matter how many plants it accumulates. He sets the standard himself, talking candidly about how scary it was at first, taking the plunge and investing their savings in a dream. </p><p>Then he makes Shane and Steven take turns in the hot seat. And, apparently, expects them to sound like functional human beings in response to questions like “what do you want this company to be in the future?”</p><p>Shane pauses for way too long, lampshade-hangs his pause, and ultimately muddles through an answer. “I want us to give people a chance to communicate things they can’t communicate elsewhere.” He’s glancing away from the camera when he says it, away from Ryan, away from his own weird communication roadblocks. But he believes.</p><p>“I know what we’re doing is working,” Ryan says during one of his self-filmed confessionals later that night. </p><p>He’s lying shirtless on his back, all scruff and specs and bedhead, and Shane is resting on his chest outside the shot. At least, he’s pretty sure Ryan’s keeping him out of it. If there’s any hint he’s there, then they just won’t use the footage and the world will miss out on Ryan giving his little entrepreneurial soliloquy wearing nothing but his glasses. </p><p>The world, Shane decides as Ryan sinks his other hand into his hair, will survive. They’re already getting quality moments like Steven’s documentation of them all using a tape measure as a jelly-bean-to-mouth implement. </p><p>He’s nuzzling kisses up Ryan’s chest the second he sets his phone aside.</p><p>But clearly Ryan isn’t entirely out of confessional mode because he’s passing Shane an index card directly, which is new. It’s also blank. “While we're having share time…” </p><p>Shane pushes himself up on one elbow to scrutinize it. “Did you write something in invisible ink this time?”</p><p>“Nah.” Ryan gives his scalp a gentle rub. “I’ve been taking you for a ride down my sexy to-do list for a few months now, but what about you?” </p><p>“Me? I’m enjoying this discovery cruise with you. It’s better than going whale-watching.”</p><p>He can already tell Ryan isn’t having it. </p><p>“I’ve always been borderline boring about sex stuff, man, sorry.” </p><p>Ryan’s not-having-it energy intensifies. “There’s <em> gotta </em>be some stuff you’ve wondered about. You know you can tell me, right? I don’t always have to be the one opening up the curiosity cabinet.”</p><p>“My curious little pal,” Shane murmurs, smiling dreamily up at him just to watch the way Ryan tries in vain not to smile back. “Your cabinet is pretty dope.” </p><p>“Don’t say dope,” Ryan sighs.</p><p>“Fleeky?” </p><p>“Now you’re trying to distract me by acting like you don’t know how words work,” Ryan accuses, not inaccurately.</p><p>“Mm.” Shane arranges himself against Ryan’s back and the duvet over both of them. “I like what we’ve been doing. And I promise, I have no complaints.”</p><p>“I’m just saying,” Ryan yawns, taking the blank card and setting it on the nightstand, “it’s there for whenever you decide to use it. A chance to communicate things you can’t communicate elsewhere, if you will.”</p><p>And for a few days, Shane will not. He almost forgets about it.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Then the Streamys happen. </p><p>Friday the 13th, mid-December in LA, which is still disconcertingly balmy for Shane’s taste. He’s longing for crisp cold snaps and pine-sharp wind and having to bundle in layers to go outside. His annual trip home for Christmas is nigh and he’s craving Chicago weather just as much as getting to see his family.</p><p>Despite taking place in winter, Streamy day doesn’t necessitate a coat. Or even a particularly formal suit. The dress code is pretty loosey-goosey, as befitting an awards ceremony that sounds like it was named after a urinary catheter.  </p><p>So he and Ryan show up to the Beverly Hilton looking like an overgrown Tony Stark and a used car salesman, respectively. Ryan is rocking a houndstooth blazer that even Shane’s untrained eye can tell is in dire need of tailoring—he guesses Ryan’s too broad in the arms and shoulders for standard sizes—and Shane is banking on his glasses and neckerchief distracting everyone from how awkward he feels. Steven is the only one of them who looks like he actually knows how to dress himself, but they can’t all be Tesla-driving, caviar-pounding fashion plates. </p><p>Ryan’s mom hugs them all and says she’s proud of them, which is far and away one of the highlights of the evening. The woman who accepted Shane as her son’s boyfriend without hesitation, who happily showed up with a puppet of her own when she learned he was making a puppet show, who has been so supportive of Watcher it’s unreal—Shane has nothing but respect for Linda Bergara. </p><p>That doesn’t keep him from photobombing them when Ryan takes a selfie with her. And, because Ryan is a sentimental goober, he posts it to his instagram when things are winding down. </p><p>Shane glances at it, but doesn’t actually <em> see </em>it until later. </p><p>He’s curled up in bed, no company but Obi since Ryan is spending the night in Arcadia, when the full force of the caption hits him.</p><p>There’s Ryan and Linda mugging and shaka-ing in true Bergara fashion, then a picture she took of all three Watcher boys, then the photobomb and a candid featuring an alarming length of Shane’s right leg. </p><p>And underneath: <em> Streamys 2K19 with family both given and chosen  </em></p><p>The comments, because he can’t <em> not </em>look, are a riot of enthusiasm. As expected, there are reactions aplenty to Ryan’s caption and Shane’s accessorizing. The longer he skims, though, the more another theme emerges.</p><p>It turns out a big chunk of their fanbase thinks it’s adorable that Ryan took his mom as his date to the Streamys. A smaller chunk, probably significantly overlapping with the first, has decided this means Shane and Steven are each other’s dates. </p><p>It’s just internet ribbing, and more often than not surrounded by gleeful emojis. Shane can’t articulate why it makes him feel like he’s been slapped and hung out to dry. </p><p>He’s on the edge of drifting into a fitful sleep when Ryan FaceTimes him. </p><p>“Hey, babe. Stop reading the comments.”</p><p>Even though Ryan is clearly in his parents’ house, Shane has the distinct feeling he’s somehow looking over his shoulder. “Uh.”</p><p>Ryan’s lamplit face creases into a smirk. “C’mon, it’s like you don’t think I know you or something.”</p><p>“No,” Shane says slowly. “No, I don’t think I’ve ever doubted that.”</p><p>The smirk blossoms into a full-on grin. Shane has never wanted to teleport into someone’s childhood bedroom more badly in his life.“Same here, big guy. So this probably is gonna seem a little out of the blue, but roll with me for a minute, okay?” He holds something square and blue up to the camera. </p><p>Shane has to squint at first, but then it comes in to focus. It seems to be the back of an envelope, possibly because index cards are hard to come by in the Bergara home in the middle of the night. </p><p>Scripted across it is the word <em> exhibitionism</em>.</p><p>This conjures up confusing visions of Ryan in fishnets and a classic flasher trench coat. “I’m...rolling,” Shane says, perplexed.</p><p>Ryan’s face reappears. “It’s not as random as you think, okay? I just want to be able to set the record straight about who my date is the next time we go to an event together. Or not straight, I guess.” </p><p>Shane’s heart lingers precariously between beats. “This seems like a very generous application of the term exhibitionism.”</p><p>“I’m not super hung up on semantics right now,” Ryan says calmly. “I <em> am </em>kind of hung up on getting to tell people about this guy I’ve been seeing because he’s pretty okay.” He looks at Shane with an impish sort of tenderness. “And I think you kind of are too. Yeah?” </p><p>He isn’t wrong, Shane realizes. That’s Ryan all over, making Shane want things he didn’t even know he wanted. He nods.</p><p>“It doesn’t have to be now,” Ryan reassures him, his voice enfolding Shane the way he wishes his arms would. “It doesn’t even have to be particularly soon, but I want it to be eventually. Is that...does that seem reasonable?” </p><p>Shane feels his gut clench, then suffuse with warmth. “Yeah, okay.” </p><p>“Really?” Ryan looks legitimately surprised, like he’d been expecting Shane to dig in his heels. Guilt spikes through Shane’s spine. </p><p>“Really. Let me start at home, then we’ll go bigger.” He grins. “I’m gonna be honest, the guy I’m seeing is pretty okay too.”</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Chicago-by-way-of-Schaumburg opens for him like a beckoning hand and Shane goes. Fitting himself back into the cadence of the city is normally natural as putting one foot in front of the other, but for some reason he feels like a discordant note in the melody this time. He catches up with a few friends, all of them alarmingly married and some with kids, and can’t bring himself to do much more than shrug when they ask if he’s seeing anyone.</p><p>Again, he can feel Ryan peering over his shoulder, this time with disappointment.</p><p>He takes in the Warhol exhibit at the art institute, takes in the decadent deliciousness of genuine deep-dish pizza. He weaves his way through Andersonville and takes pictures of his pie at First Slice to send to Ryan. And at the end of each day, he takes in the sight of sun splintering through the trees on the street he grew up, familiar as a million mornings.</p><p>He doesn’t make good on his promise until he’s crowded around the dining room table with Scott and their parents. They’re engaged in a particularly intense round of Blokus by the light of the Christmas tree and Sherry Madej’s not-to-be-trifled-with illuminated wreaths. </p><p>There is also, incidentally, spiked eggnog. That helps.</p><p>“Did I tell you guys I’m dating someone?” Shane asks, knowing damn well he hasn’t. </p><p>“Beginner’s luck,” Scott quips, setting a tile onto the board with aplomb.</p><p>“I think we’d remember if you had,” his dad points out, which is just unnecessary. </p><p>His mom is a little more forgiving. “I’m amazed you’ve had time for it, you’ve been so busy. Did you meet someone while you were out shooting?”</p><p>Scott looks delighted. “I’m calling it now. This is his secret weapon for getting sponsors.”</p><p>“That would be unprofessional,” Shane says, regarding him with mock severity over the rim of his glass.</p><p>“I think that’s wonderful, sweetie. Who is it?” Sherry asks, ever the eye of the storm.</p><p>Shane tries valiantly to sound casual and not like he’s suddenly been possessed by a tongue-tied middle schooler. It doesn’t go well. “Oh, uh. You actually already know him? Ryan? Um, Bergara?”</p><p>“That's not unprofessional at all,” Scott drawls.</p><p>Shane considers throwing a tile at him.</p><p>“Seriously, Brogara? He's not straight?” Scott’s brows are halfway into his hairline. “Wow, congrats.”</p><p>The thing is, Shane doesn't know how to explain it. That all their years of working together have been a process of knitting together the most uncertain, delicate edges of themselves and somehow using them to form a path forward. That the past few months are just the newest iteration of their capacity to complete each other. That Ryan is the sun of his world and Shane is happy to stay caught in his scorching orbit for as long as he’ll let him.</p><p>Just the idea of trying to articulate that to his entire family makes him want to disintegrate, so he doesn’t try. “Guess not, dumbass.”</p><p>“Stop antagonizing your brother,” Mark says mildly.</p><p>“Yeah!” Scott and Shane agree in unison.</p><p>In many ways, it really is good to be home. </p><p>The weather is fiercely cold and completely free of the dry, desolate sweep of the Santa Anas. LA is gritty under its shellacked sheen of artifice, buffed and polished and bedecked with palm trees to distract from its seamier sides, which are many. In Schaumburg, there’s not a palm tree to be seen. And Chicago might bristle with skyscrapers and a roughness of its own, but it makes no bones about it and there are buildings in certain pockets of town that still revel in old-world quaintness. </p><p>Sherry seems determined to make their house one of them. She takes advantage of having three giants around and sets them to work hanging Christmas lights outside, noses red and breath emerging in puffs of steam. Shane and Scott gamely make the front yard festive as fuck, all while sniping at each other in ways they never do in LA, fueled by mutual nostalgia and home court advantage. </p><p>It takes Shane a moment to realize he just used a basketball term to mentally describe something, and that as far as he knows he did it correctly. </p><p>He suddenly misses Ryan so much it whisks the ground out from under him.</p><p>They’ve been texting casually ever since Shane flew home, sending pictures back and forth with snippets of commentary. It’s nice to have a little breathing space away from each other. He and Ryan have been grafted into each other’s lives so thoroughly, sometimes it helps to remind himself they aren’t unhealthily codependent.</p><p>All the same, Shane takes matters into his own hands.</p><p><em> NSFW incoming, </em> he texts later that night, and waits for Ryan to reply.</p><p>It takes less than ten seconds for Ryan to send him a 👀.</p><p>Without fanfare, Shane sends him a picture. It’s an off-center selfie of his body, bare from nips to hips, almost tasteful aside from the part where he’s streaked white and glistening with his own come. </p><p>Ryan’s response is a series of exclamation points and <em> oh my god what the duck how are you so hot and so far away.  </em></p><p><em> I got inspired before I cleaned up</em>, Shane tells him, because really, there’s no wrong response to that.  </p><p><em> Wanna lick it, </em>Ryan texts back plaintively, which makes Shane bite the inside of his cheek.</p><p>Then: <em> wait are you in your parents house???  </em></p><p>That’s a hard left away from sext town, but Shane allows it. <em> Yeah? Don’t worry, I’m good at being quiet when I jerk off. </em></p><p>Ryan leaves him on read for a few minutes, which could mean anything. Maybe he’s framing the perfect dick pic to send in return, or maybe he’s gathering his thoughts before sharing a few more choice words about what else he’d like to do to Shane. What he eventually does send is neither of these.</p><p>
  <em> Dude this isn’t about you. What happens when i go out there with you and have to deal with being in the house where you jerked it??? How do I even look at your mom?? </em>
</p><p>Shane cocks a brow at his phone. <em> There are many things to unpack here. Let’s start with this one: you want to come stay at Chez Madej next time I’m out here? </em></p><p><em>Yes.</em> <em>Duh</em>. There’s a small pause before Ryan judiciously adds, <em>Or maybe at a hotel nearby chez Madej. One with nice thick walls </em>😅😉</p><p>There are three days left before Shane goes back to LA, and Ryan has him practically floating through all of them.</p><p>The day he flies in, after getting reacquainted with his apartment and picking up Obi, he goes over to Ryan’s. He doesn’t announce himself and Ryan isn’t even home—Disneyland two days after Christmas, because why not—but it doesn’t matter. The blank index card is still on his nightstand, underneath a phone charger and a pair of socks. </p><p>Shane takes his time penciling it in. Sexting is a given, he’s getting more intrigued by that. It feels kind of cheesy to write <em> come to Chicago with me</em>, but it’s true and he figures Ryan will appreciate a little cheese, so he adds it and then leaves the card on Ryan’s bed.</p><p>On second thought, he kicks off his shoes and leaves himself in Ryan's bed too. </p><p>He adds a couple additional words to the card, then settles in for a nap and for whenever Disneyland releases Ryan from its corporate clutches. Reunion sex isn’t going to check itself off the list and he needs to rest up.</p><p>It’s good to be home.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>The new year comes and goes without another index card. They have a belated Christmas, which mostly involves spending a few days holed up together in Shane's place. Historically, they haven't been great about gifting each other, but it seems important to step up their game. </p><p>He gets Ryan a set of hand lettering Prismacolors and immediately clarifies that he really does support Ryan’s calligraphy hobby for what it is, not just because he’s been benefiting from it. Ryan gets him a French press and immediately clarifies it’s because Shane mentioned once that he’d never had one and this one was on sale at Target. Shane is surprised there's no card in the box, not that he checks twice to be sure or anything. </p><p>Then he looks up, locks eyes with Ryan for a beat, and both of them crack up.</p><p>Ryan shakes his head. “Jesus, why can’t we just kiss and say thank you like normal couples?”</p><p>They’re on Shane’s couch, the coffee table covered with discarded wrapping paper and the remnants of dinner. Obi is batting at a ribbon and staunchly avoiding even looking at their bowls of slightly overcooked pasta. There’s a Santa hat perched on the corner of the television, which is currently paused partway through Die Hard so it looks like Bruce Willis is wearing it. </p><p>It’s alarmingly domestic.</p><p>Shane bats his eyes. “Thanks, honeybun.”</p><p>“That was terrifying,” Ryan informs him. “Thanks, fluffernutter.” </p><p>“Nailed it.”</p><p>They fistbump without looking at each other. Ryan unpauses the movie.</p><p>By the time credits are rolling, neither of them is paying any attention to the screen. Shane is busy being facedown with his shirt shoved under his armpits as Ryan cheerfully breaks in his Prismacolors. </p><p>It’s not easy being a human canvas. Ryan is seated on his thighs, which means the crotch of his jeans presses right up against Shane’s ass when he leans in to scrawl something in long swooping lines between his shoulder blades. He seems determined to apply every last piece of his present to Shane’s skin. The brush-tipped pens are smooth and ticklish, a little like being lapped by tiny tongues, and the nibbed ones scratch over his nerve endings in the most infuriating way. The total effect is enough to make him grind his dick into the couch cushions.</p><p>“Quit wiggling, you made me fuck up my G,” Ryan whines, which gives Shane the horrific image of an lopsided I Love Ghosts written across his back. </p><p>“Want me to give you some more real estate to work with?” Shane offers, not waiting for an answer before he squirms his shirt the rest of the way off. “Paint the town, baby.” </p><p>Ryan heaves a sigh, the beleaguered artist, and starts something new at the base of Shane’s spine. </p><p>“Wait. Are you giving me a tramp stamp?”</p><p>“Sure am, unless you want to turn over.” </p><p>Shane flips onto his back so fast he almost bucks Ryan off him like the world’s lamest mechanical bull.</p><p>Ryan laughs into their kisses, searing them against his mouth until Shane’s face aches from smiling and stubble burn. He skims his fingers over the bulge of Shane’s cock, then undoes his pants. Shane makes a raw, startled sound, anticipating the touch of Ryan’s warm palm against his dick. It never comes. Ryan seems content to wedge his fingertips under the waistband of his boxers, tugging them down just enough to bare the pale crest of his hip. </p><p>And, stroke by agonizing stroke, he skillfully scripts his own name into the cradle of Shane’s hipbone. </p><p>Shane stays as still as he can as he waits for him to finish. Ryan seems intent on adding little flourishes just to make his stomach twitch. And maybe Shane’s feeling a little sentimental due to belated Christmas spirit and the way Ryan bites his lip as he concentrates, but he’s suddenly bowled over by a swell of fondness so acutely it makes his eyes sting. And Ryan, who always gives him such careful attention, is too busy focusing it all on his hip to notice when Shane blinks it away.</p><p>“Well,” Ryan announces, sitting back on his heels. “Looks like you’re mine now. I’ve got my name on you, that means I get to do whatever I want to you.”</p><p>Shane doesn’t argue. He doesn’t say <em> I'm already yours</em>, but he thinks he conveys as much in the hitch of his breath, in the way his hands curve around Ryan’s biceps. Ryan just cocks an eyebrow at him.</p><p>“You’re getting pretty hard over a little writing.”</p><p>“I told you,” Shane says, with as much dignity as he can muster, “I support your hobby. It’s very enriching.”</p><p>“Oh wow,” Ryan breathes, sounding unsettlingly like Steven Lim for a moment. “Am I training you to get calligraphy boners? Like some Pavlovian thing?” </p><p>Shane tilts his head, considering. Ryan’s smile softens. “Am <em> I </em> your Pavlovian thing?”</p><p>They abandon the living room in favor of bed. Shane loses himself in the sweet, hot press of Ryan’s body. If he keeps glancing down to admire how nicely Ryan’s name stands out against his skin, he doesn’t care. Art deserves recognition.    </p><p>“Tell me what you need, daddy,” Ryan begs, his tongue tracing a heated point around Shane’s nipple. </p><p>“Whatever you want,” Shane volleys his own words back at him. “But if you’re looking for feedback, I think you should fuck me.”</p><p>Ryan smiles into his throat. “I can do that. Gonna make you nice and loose for me, then make you blow your load all over my name without even touching this big ol’ dick.” He rubs a thumb up Shane’s frenulum for emphasis. “Sound good?”</p><p>Obligingly, Shane’s cock spills out a stream of precome. “Jesus Christ, Ryan, <em>yes</em>.” </p><p>His thighs are trembling when Ryan sinks inside him. All the way to the root, one hot roll of his hips seating him fully. He rocks between Shane’s thighs, shallow little pushes that nudge his cockhead right up against Shane’s prostate. “You want me to pull out, daddy? Or you want me to stay right here and come inside you?"</p><p>“Stay.” He fumbles for Ryan’s hand, squeezes. “Please, please stay.”</p><p>True to his word, Ryan makes him come without laying a finger on him. He ushers Shane into the shower afterward, insists on scrubbing him clean until there’s no trace of ink left on him. </p><p>And, even then, he refuses to tell Shane just what the hell he wrote on his back. </p><p>“Please tell me it wasn’t <em> ghosts are real,</em>” Shane mumbles into his pillow, his body flooded with endorphins and exhaustion. </p><p>Ryan brushes the gentlest of kisses against his temple. </p><p>“It wasn’t,” he says, “but I’m more than happy to let you believe it was.”</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>When he wakes up, Ryan is already out of bed, but there's an index card lying on his pillow like a hotel mint.</p><p><em> Gagging, </em> it says in one of Ryan's new pens.</p><p>Shane grimaces.</p><p>He finds Ryan in the kitchen, making an omelet and watching some basketball recap on his iPad. As always, it sends a pang straight through him seeing Ryan navigate Shane’s apartment like it's his too. Shane lifts the card, vaguely wondering if Ryan carries them around with him or if he brought some along in case he got inspired. “Morning. So, ah, do you mean this in the sense of gagging on dick or...?”</p><p>“Like that tree branch in your pants doesn't do that enough already,” Ryan says archly. “No, I mean like...gags. On my face.”</p><p>“Believe it or not, that’s something I’ve tried before.”</p><p>Ryan pauses, one hand poised to sprinkle more diced peppers into the frying pan, and gapes at him. “Dude.”</p><p>“I didn’t like it,” Shane says in a rush. “This guy I hooked up with when I was working at Starbucks. He was into it, I wasn’t.” There’s something unsettling about muzzling your partner, extinguishing verbal cues. He just hadn’t been able to put his finger on it at the time, so he’d gone along with it. There weren’t many bright spots during his Starbucks days, and at least getting laid was one of them. </p><p>“Also, I know I give you a lot of grief about them, but I love the sounds you make.”</p><p>Ryan looks positively enchanted. “I know I tell you to shut up a lot, but same.” Shane slots himself against him from behind, the scent of Ryan’s shampoo tickling his nose when he buries a kiss in his hair. “And that’s cool. It's not up your alley, so we don't do it. Nothing you don't want.”</p><p>Shane tightens his arms around his waist, reluctantly cracking his eyes open to make sure Ryan hasn’t forgotten about his omelet. “Thanks.”</p><p>“It's kind of relieving, to be honest. I was worried you weren't into some of the stuff we've tried and just weren't telling me, so I'm glad you've got limits.” </p><p>It’s as if Ryan whirled around and slammed the frying pan straight into his nose. Shane takes a half-step back. “You thought I'd just go along with anything?”</p><p>“You can be pretty stubborn, so no, but I know you don't like confrontation. Sometimes there doesn’t even have to be one, though.” Ryan squares his shoulders and tries to flip his omelet. It lands back in the pan in a heap. “Fuck.”</p><p>Normally, Shane would nudge him out of the way and take over, but he’s frozen in place. “I’d tell you, you know. You don’t have to freak out over me not knowing my limits.” </p><p>Ryan gives him a brief, knowing glance that rocks him to the core. “Noted. But sometimes you don’t tell me stuff. You can.”</p><p>“I don’t have a lot of kinky stuff to tell.”</p><p>“It doesn't always have to be kinky stuff, you know.” Ryan wrinkles his nose and spatulas the erstwhile omelet onto a couple plates. “Sometimes it can just be stuff.”</p><p>Shane feels like there’s something he’s supposed to say here, something important. He plucks a strip of bacon from its bed of paper towels and crams it into his mouth. If Ryan seems a little disappointed as they tuck themselves beside each other in the breakfast nook, Shane avoids noticing by intently checking his phone as they eat. After a time, though, Ryan’s hand steals up between his shoulders, sketching patterns there with his fingertips.</p><p>“What are you doing?”</p><p>Ryan gives him a pitying look. “You’re supposed to guess, dumbass. Didn’t you ever play that game where you'd write a word on your friend's back with your finger and they'd have to guess what it was?”</p><p>He writes it again and again, but Shane never guesses correctly. </p><p>When Ryan leaves for the gym, because apparently he needs to prove to his trainer he's serious about New Year's resolutions, Shane stands in front of his bathroom mirror. He strips off his shirt and scrutinizes the skin of his back under the fluorescent lights, but there's nothing left of the words Ryan wrote on his body. No trace at all of whatever he'd been trying to say with fingers and ink.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Shortly after Watcher premieres, Ryan gives him a ring.</p><p>A cock ring, specifically, one that materializes on top of Shane’s dresser along with a card that says <em> denial</em>.</p><p>Shane, without thinking, observes aloud that it’s the first time a partner's ever given him a ring of any kind. </p><p>“Keep doing what you’re doing and it won’t be the last.” Ryan winks at him and breezes right along with apparently zero awareness that he’s just knocked Shane’s world off its axis. “Anyway,” he helpfully explains, “I thought you could put it on me and let me give you whatever you want.” </p><p>He grins, wide and wicked.</p><p>Shane is still a bit off-kilter from Ryan’s words, Ryan’s arms in that stupid purple tank top, Ryan’s diffident service top tendencies. “I want what you do.”</p><p>“Knew you were gonna say that,” Ryan mutters.</p><p>As it turns out, there's another side to denial, a far less sexy one.</p><p>Ryan plants his hands on his hips in a way that Shane’s not certain he likes, aside from the way it shows off every muscle in his arms. Then he says four of Shane’s least favorite words.</p><p>“We need to talk.” </p><p>Shane is <em> very </em>much certain he does not like this. “Um, about what?” Maybe he’s misreading the vibe and Ryan just really wants to discuss the weather. Shane is suddenly very interested in discussing the weather.</p><p>“About <em> this</em>.” Ryan waves a hand that could very well be indicating the weather but most likely is not.</p><p>Shane considers being a coward and claiming a sudden migraine. It’s been a long day; he might actually be able to pull it off. It was his turn to be Steven’s second banana at a pitch meeting this afternoon, while Ryan had opted to work from home after lunch. Work in this context had meant lounging around in skimpy athleisure while answering their corporate emails and trying to learn how the hell to Discord.</p><p>Home had meant Shane's place instead of his own. </p><p>The second he contemplates fibbing, Shane knows there’s no way he can actually do it. </p><p>“Okay,” he says, and shoves his twitching fingers into his pockets for want of something to fidget with.</p><p>“It’s the whole ‘if you ask me to do something, I’ll do it’ thing you always pull.” Ryan sounds like he’s slowly being deflated. “I thought you’d do it less often once we’d been together a little while, but like...you’re not.”</p><p>“This is your first time doing stuff with a guy.”</p><p>Ryan crosses his arms, which is unfair to Shane’s focus and the seams of his tank top. “I’m aware.”</p><p>“Exactly! You deserve to feel comfortable about plunging into the great unknown. I don’t want to put pressure on you.” </p><p>“Shane,” Ryan says, very gently, “you couldn’t put pressure on a panini. And I’m not even gonna touch what the hell the great unknown is, but it better not be your ass.”</p><p>Shane winces reflexively, but he does have a point.</p><p>“Besides,” Ryan goes on, “you can’t always just let me call all the shots. That’s not fair. And, I’ve gotta be honest, man, it’s kind of stressful sometimes. I’m not a mind reader.” </p><p>Inside his pockets, Shane’s hands clench and unclench. He’d kill to have something in just one of them. A pencil, a glass of wine, Ryan’s hand. Most of all, Ryan’s hand. “I don’t want to screw this up.” </p><p>Ryan inclines his head, mutely urging him to go on. Shane desperately wishes he wouldn’t, that he actually was a mind reader. He swallows around the sharp-edged knot building in his throat. “You mean a lot to me, okay? I don’t want to upset the balance by putting my foot in my mouth. It’s easier to let you take the lead.”</p><p>“That’s cool and all, but there’s a lot of emotional labor that goes with taking the lead. It needs to be both of us. I don’t always want to think you’re holding back, and I don’t want to always be telling you to <em> not </em>hold back.” Ryan pulls a face. “I can’t believe we’re having an ‘I want you to want to do the dishes’ kind of talk, oh my god, who even are we.”</p><p>Shane hitches a shoulder. “Hey, I’m a big guy and you don’t want to seem pushy when you’re a big guy. It’s a reflex.”</p><p>“That doesn’t mean you have to just sit back and not take any initiative ever, does it? It doesn’t stop you when we’re at work.”</p><p>It kind of does. Shane fades into the background as much as he can, mild-mannered and affable. It’s just best practice, self-preservation. “Well, I wouldn’t expect you, of all people, to understand what it’s like to be a big guy.” It’s not his most sophisticated tactic, trying to deflect and bait Ryan into a more surface-level argument than the one he suspects they’re wading into, but it’s worth a try.</p><p>Ryan sighs and stalks into the hallway. “Cheap shot, babe,” he tosses over his shoulder. “But go on, tell me more about your Paul Bunyan complex or whatever it’s called.”</p><p>“That would make you the babe,” Shane retorts, following him.</p><p>“Oh my <em> god</em>, can we not go off on a tangent about a big blue ox? This shouldn’t even be that hard of a conversation to have.”</p><p>“Yeah, I...I kind of make stuff more convoluted than it needs to be,” he informs Ryan’s back, on account of how Ryan’s front is engaged in fishing a beer out of the fridge. “But you make it seem so easy. You’ve got all these ideas and you just...you just jump right in, no matter how new something is.” </p><p>He envies that about Ryan sometimes, his capacity for risk-taking. Without it, they wouldn’t have their own company, probably wouldn’t ever have kissed, because Shane is the opposite of a risk-taker unless he’s built himself a few escape tunnels first.</p><p>Ryan rounds on him. He’s brandishing a bottle of Blue Moon like a flag, which is concerning on a few different levels. “That’s cute. You think it was easy for me to realize I was totally ass over teakettle for you? Or ass over whatever for you? Why the fuck is there even a teakettle involved?”</p><p>This actually is something Shane has wondered about, but never asked. Ryan went from hetero bro to intrepid explorer of distant bisexual horizons in an awfully short space of time. “I meant that in a good way!” he protests. “I came out in high school and there’s stuff on your sex checklist <em> I’ve </em> never done before. You’re like the poster boy for bi liberation.”</p><p>As compliments go, this one couldn’t fall farther from its target if he tried. Ryan cracks open his bottle and stares at him in disbelief while taking a long swig from it. “Dude, what? I’m not just using you as some kind of sentient sex doll. The list thing...I wouldn’t do that with anyone else. I want it with you because I want everything with you. I <em> trust </em>you.”</p><p>The word trust pinwheels between them in a way that stops Shane in his tracks. </p><p>“And it was never <em> easy</em>,” Ryan bursts out. “You think it was easy? To just kiss you in the freakin’ parking lot like that? That wasn’t just an impulse, that was the grand finale of way too many feelings I’d spent way too long trying to figure out. After, by the way, I’d spent an even longer time trying to ignore them.” </p><p>He pauses for breath. Shane crosses the kitchen to him in two swift strides.</p><p>“It wasn’t easy,” Ryan says softly. His cheeks are hot under Shane’s hands. “Doing that was probably the scariest moment of my life.”</p><p>He’s seen Ryan scared so many times. Ryan leaps in terror at strong breezes, at imagined spirits, at the dark and anything that might be in it. And Shane...Shane has laughed along with every provocation, never imagining his presence might be one of them.</p><p>Ryan’s face is tilted upward, lashes down, cherubic and tragic. Plush lower lip, unruly hair, shoulders slumped as if he’s too tired to stand up straight. Shane folds him into his arms, keeps him where he needs to be, and he kisses him—his cheeks, his forehead, his jaw—kisses him as if he can’t remember how to do anything else, as if he’ll be unwhole if he stops.</p><p>Ryan's fingers clutch at the back of his henley, rucking it up Shane's spine. There's no heat behind it, only an urgency of a different kind. “The kinky shit, the sex stuff, that’s just the tip of the iceberg, man. I still can’t believe I get to have you. There’s so much more than the stuff on index cards.”</p><p>Over the tremolo of his pulse, Shane hears the seams of his shirt strain as Ryan tightens his hold. And even though he has no right to ask Ryan for explanations after offering so little in return, he does. “What are you saying, sweetheart?” </p><p>And instead of laughing in his face, Ryan looks into it with eyes so wide they swallow Shane whole, glinting jasper-flecked umber in the fierce kitchen lighting. “I’m saying if it were possible and you wanted me to, I would knock you up in a heartbeat. I would freaking teleport to Chicago if I knew how. I’d do whatever you said I could do, as long as you wanted it and I <em> could</em>.”</p><p>“Oh,” Shane says quietly, “<em>Ryan</em>.”</p><p>“I know.” Incongruously, Ryan grins at him, It’s a self-mocking, what-can-you-do sort of grin, and one that he hides almost immediately when he drops his face against Shane’s shoulder. “You can tell me anything, big guy. Just don’t say it so softly I can’t hear. I want to hear you. I always want to hear you. And I’ve got so much I still want to say to you.”</p><p>A jumble of emotions, jagged and riotous, pushes its edges against the inside of Shane’s skin from all angles. Every confession, every truth and insecurity Ryan has ever confided in him flips through his mind. “I do too, believe it or not.  I’m just kind of...not great at it to begin with and I think I got spooked early on. Remember how you called your mom and told her we were dating before it had even been a month?”</p><p>Ryan’s head pops back up, eyes narrowed this time. “Yeah, because you're important to me and I wanted her to know! I didn’t realize that bothered you because, wait for it, <em> you never said anything</em>.”</p><p>“What was I supposed to do, say ‘oh hey, maybe don’t tell your mom yet’? Because then you’d be like ‘oh, why shouldn’t I tell her, do you think we’re not gonna last?’ and no good was ever going to come of that conversation.” Ryan has wriggled out of his embrace and started chugging the rest of his Blue Moon. Shane winces, but soldiers on. “I didn’t want to make you doubt anything! You were so happy about us. I want you to be happy.”</p><p>“I want you to be happy too!” Ryan explodes. “That means I want you to be comfortable saying stuff. You could’ve said ‘hey Ryan, it’s been like two weeks, maybe slow your roll,’ and I would’ve totally gotten that.” </p><p>He drains the rest of the bottle and sets it onto the counter with an air of great resignation. “Shane, seriously, what the fuck? You don’t have to roll all these anxieties around in your head until they snowball into something so much bigger than they need to be. Even your big old skull can’t hold all that.”</p><p>“I just didn’t want to fuck it up.” Shane rakes a hand through his hair. The other is clamped on the counter edge now that he doesn’t have Ryan to hold onto. “I mean, I <em> still </em>don’t. But the last thing I wanted was you having to call your mom back to tell her it didn’t work out.”</p><p>“Well, I was relatively sure you wouldn’t be going anywhere, seeing as,” Ryan ticks off on his fingers, “A, we’ve gotten along just fine without killing each other for years. B, I’m super fucking ass-over-whatever for you. And C, you’re my best fucking friend and I thought we had a shot at the real thing.”</p><p>“Whoa, what—I didn’t realize—” </p><p>Ryan’s eyebrows leap. </p><p>Shane can’t backpedal fast enough. </p><p>“Fuck, I mean, I <em> did </em>realize...I just think I’m still waiting for you to realize this isn’t what you want.” It hurts to say it out loud and must hurt even more for Ryan to hear, but Shane forces himself not to squeeze his eyes shut. </p><p>Despite having every right to, Ryan doesn’t turn on his heel and walk away. Ryan catches him by the nape like an unruly kitten and hauls him in close. </p><p>Shane stumbles a bit, but Ryan is there. He lets Shane crumple against him, holds him tight with those dizzyingly solid arms. When he speaks, he sounds like there’s something blocking his throat. Somehow, Shane knows beyond the shadow of a doubt that it’s not because of him, but <em> for </em> him. “Hey. <em> Hey</em>. Shane, baby, no. It was never that. It was always the opposite of that.” </p><p>Ryan’s mouth is petal-soft against his jaw, his fingers gentle as he strokes through his hair like Shane is someone small and delicate and loved. “You’re kind of it for me, man. After I kissed you the first time, I was cresting the wave, you know? I wanted to keep on riding it and I wanted the whole world to know.” </p><p>His hand migrates back to Shane’s nape and squeezes. Shane’s breath comes rushing out in a shudder that has him tangling both hands in Ryan’s shirt for purchase. </p><p>“You’re the wave,” Ryan adds helpfully. “Your dick is the wave. Uh, I don’t want to tell my mom that, but like, I want to make it all the way to the shore with you. Okay?” </p><p>He flashes a smile and a half-assed shaka. </p><p>Shane is in very real danger of melting into a puddle on his kitchen floor. </p><p>For as long as he’s known him, Ryan has always been so unabashedly enthusiastic about what he likes. Shane, on the other hand, is a case study in overcoming his own guardedness, forever wielding the double-edged dagger of self-preservation and self-isolation. He’s got a lifetime’s worth of carefully built walls around him, walls of nonchalance and sarcasm and languid-limbed easiness. It can be a very long process before he decides to wedge open a portcullis and let anyone in. </p><p>But Ryan has always been inside it with him, waiting for him to notice. </p><p>“I'm sorry.” He untangles his hands from Ryan’s shirt. “I’ll do better. I promise.”</p><p>Ryan nods, assessing. “Good. Because it’s not enough that you do stuff when I suggest it. Sometimes you’ll open up if I specifically ask you to tell me, but you almost never take the initiative. Even for the most vanilla stuff. It's never ‘yo, Ryan, I want to hold your hand at some hipster dive bar and then fuck you till you see stars’ or whatever.”</p><p>“I do.” </p><p>“Do what?”</p><p>“Want to fuck you until you see stars.”</p><p>Ryan’s cheeks flush a bit darker. “Sick. Now can we officially make some sweet, sweet love and call this fight done?”</p><p>Shane grins. A little more of the coiled-up tension in his body eases away. “You really want to mark the occasion, huh?” </p><p>“Yes,” Ryan says gravely. “But that's not the only reason.”</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>It turns out Ryan had a whole eloquent argument with him while stuffed with a butt plug.</p><p>“No offense,” Shane says conversationally, “but what the everloving fuck is wrong with you?”</p><p>Ryan stretches luxuriantly across the bed, the cheeky hedonist down to his toes. “C’mon, you have to admit it would’ve made for a great parting shot if we <em> didn’t </em>kiss and make up. Picture it, I smack you down by saying I'm not letting you play with my shiny new toy, you spend the night with the bluest balls known to man and eventually come groveling back to beg my pardon.”</p><p>Shane scrunches his brows together as he peels off his socks. “First, I don’t grovel. Second, ‘shiny new toy’ makes it sound like a rattle or a pacifier.”</p><p>“I mean,” Ryan says philosophically, “a butt plug is just a pacifier for your ass. An assifier, even.”</p><p>Shane closes his eyes. </p><p>Ryan cackles. “You sure you don’t want to try gagging me?”</p><p>“What I want,” Shane says, pitching his voice low, “is for you to show me what you did to yourself.”</p><p>Ryan whimpers a curse and lets his thighs fall open. And there it is, the dark gleaming base of a plug nestled between his cheeks.</p><p>“Holy fuck,” Shane mutters. Part of him wishes he could record this because the simple act of Ryan showing himself is hotter than any porn he's ever seen. And Shane is incredibly picky about porn. “Okay. Check in.” </p><p>Ryan nods. </p><p>Over the past few months, they’ve learned that the scales tip between praise and degradation for both of them. Ryan, of course, is more explicit about what he likes—there are times when he wants to be called a slut, and other times when he wants to be showered in compliments. It works out well because Shane has a much harder time with the former and Ryan is usually glutton for the latter, lapping up praise of indeterminate gender. </p><p>All the same, it’s important to be sure. Shane trails a thumb over his lower lip, rides his cock into the crease of his thigh, and asks, “Do you want to be good for me tonight?”</p><p>“Yes, daddy,” Ryan says dreamily.</p><p>“Okay,” Shane breathes. “You’re so good, Ry, you look so pretty for me.” He flushes, hesitates over his words the way he always does before he hits his stride. But Ryan never seems to mind it, arching and exhaling a moan underneath him, and that bolsters his confidence. “Is this why you worked from home all afternoon, sweetheart? You needed me in you that bad?”</p><p>“Yeah,” Ryan croaks. His body undulates like a skein of silk.</p><p>It’s catching; Shane can feel his own inhibitions dropping away by the moment. He guides Ryan’s thighs to part even wider, dipping a finger down between them to trace the slick, stretched rim of him where the plug disappears. “Poor baby girl, you just couldn't wait to get something inside you.”</p><p>And Ryan groans, rolls up tightly against Shane, the friction for between their bodies mind-meltingly good already. "Yeah," he repeats in a whisper, pressing their foreheads together as if he’s sharing a secret. "Needed it ’cause I wanted you in me, so fucking bad." He noses at Shane’s cheek and whines, all breathless and hurt-sounding, when Shane palms his ass open, taps the flared black base of the plug. “Missed you so much.”</p><p>Shane takes a hitching breath and dares to move closer, rolling into Ryan and whispering in his ear. "Does it hurt?"</p><p>“Uh-huh.” Ryan kisses him, snags at his lips with gentle nips of his teeth. “It's a good hurt, though. Like a stretch that’s still not enough.” The look he gives Shane makes it quite clear what he thinks <em> would </em>be enough. </p><p>He catches Shane's fingers in his mouth, all gentle and soft and wet, face going a bit pained as Shane eases the plug out of him. </p><p>"There you go," Shane murmurs. He nudges Ryan’s plug aside, then slips him two fingers in return. Ryan groans around the fingers of his other hand, tongue darting between them like a velvet flame.</p><p>“Condom or no?” </p><p>Loath as he is to leave Ryan's body untouched for even the smallest blink of a moment, he’ll pull away to get one from the bedside table if he must.</p><p>“No,” Ryan says, letting Shane’s fingers slip wetly from his mouth. “Make a mess of me all you want, big guy.” </p><p>He smiles and a twist of heat corkscrews up Shane’s spine, something stark and sweet and overwhelming. Shane has to bend in closer and share it with him, cupping Ryan’s warm, scruffy cheek in his hand as he kisses him, on his mouth and eyelids and down the sweep of his jaw. Ryan seems content to let himself be coddled, melting under Shane’s mouth as he strokes up inside him. He lets out a soft whine when Shane stills his fingers, buffing his head against Shane’s shoulder like a cat. </p><p>Shane nuzzles down the flex of his abs, the cut of his hip. Ryan is so warm under him, soft golden skin touched pink from Shane’s mouth. “Shhh, I’ve got you. Can I suck you first, baby girl?”</p><p>The sound Ryan utters is half a grunt, half a squeak, and entirely affirmative. </p><p>And Shane goes down, rubbing steady little strokes against Ryan’s prostate as he works a third finger into him. </p><p>He takes his time, slowly and sweetly worshiping Ryan's cock. Tonguing under the lip of his foreskin, letting his teeth graze the sensitive head, working the tip of his tongue into the slit of him just to feel the tiny gush of precome against it. This is a skill Shane has honed to an art form over the years, partly because he genuinely enjoys it and partly, if he's entirely honest, because he can't talk while doing it. </p><p>Ryan guides him close with a hand cupping the back of his head and, true to form, talks enough for both of them.“Fuck, <em>fuck</em>, daddy, ’m gonna—” he chants when Shane swallows him down to the root, breathless. </p><p>Shane doesn’t pull off, delighting in the moan that rips through Ryan’s body as he pulses hot spurts of come into Shane’s mouth. And even after that, Shane stays, licking at him to coax out the last remnants of come, happy to linger there while Ryan combs through his hair with his fingers. He could stay this way all night, just pressing kisses into Ryan’s skin and breathing in the heady, satisfied scent of his pleasure knowing<em> he did that. </em> Ryan <em> let </em> him do that. </p><p>And because he’s learning, he lets himself murmur that into the arch of Ryan's hip bone, eyes closed. "I love getting to make you feel like this." So softly he scarcely hears it himself, but the answering scrape of Ryan’s fingernails along his scalp tells him it finds the mark just fine.</p><p>"You take such good care of me, don’t you?” Ryan murmurs after a minute. He sounds almost awestruck. “My turn now, okay? Let me make you feel good, too."</p><p>The next thing Shane knows, he has a lapful of warm, squirming Ryan stroking his cock and sucking on his neck. “Look at you, daddy, you need it so much, don’t you?” And sinking down on him with devastating slowness, mouth parting as Shane’s cock presses him open wider than his fingers, wider than the plug. </p><p>Shane can only clutch his hips and let him.</p><p>“Fucking...<em> big </em>, Jesus Christ,” Ryan whimpers, and rocks down a little more, takes him in a little deeper. Even though he’s already one orgasm in, his dick twitches valiantly against his thigh.</p><p>“Please,” Shane begs him, tremulous. “Ryan, Ryan, <em> please</em>.”</p><p>And Ryan stops, pausing in the midst of crooning praises so abruptly Shane has a flash of panic that he’s hurt him somehow. “Shit, dude. The cock ring’s still in the kitchen.”</p><p>“If you leave to go get it, I will literally turn into a pumpkin,” Shane warns him, tightening his fingers on Ryan’s hips in case he does decide to make a break for it.</p><p>Ryan tilts his head, going a bit glassy-eyed when Shane palms a handful of his ass, drawing the cheeks apart to touch the point where their bodies meet. “True, not like it’s gonna expire if we leave it too long.”</p><p>And he sinks down the rest of the way, taking Shane fully inside him in one smooth movement.</p><p>“Another time, though,” Shane tells him, letting the words fall from his tongue unheedingly as Ryan begins to move. “Another time, I want you to be a good boy and keep it on for me.” </p><p>Ryan arches above him, throat bared, lit up by the flicker of the sunset through the blinds that stripes him in scorch-orange and shadow. </p><p>“You’ll do it for me, won’t you?” Shane strokes over his thighs, his stomach, his bare beautiful back. “You’ll be daddy's good boy and let me play with you like that.”</p><p>Ryan clutches him, biceps shifting, a sheen of sweat and sunlight glistening over his skin. “Anything,” he whispers, head lagging forward as if he’s praying. “Shane, you’ve gotta know that by now. I’d do fucking anything you asked me to, anything you want.”</p><p>“I wanna be able to keep this,” Shane whispers. His hands trace reverent paths up Ryan’s flanks, grasping for purchase on his slick skin, grasping for words like he’s drowning for want of them. “I want to keep us.”</p><p>“I want that too,” Ryan murmurs. His thighs are taut, body a flex of muscle and flame as he rides Shane’s lap, takes Shane into him over and over. The touch he presses to Shane’s sternum is delicate, but Shane is sure Ryan can somehow feel the swell of his heartbeat with each breath. </p><p>“Shane.” Ryan’s mouth hushes against his own. “Shane, fuck, I want <em> everything </em>with you.”</p><p>It’s too much. Shane trembles apart against him. </p><p>Ryan holds him, lets him break into a million pieces and reform himself. </p><p>When Shane catches his breath, his eyes are swimming with a haziness that has nothing to do with not wearing his glasses. His throat is too raw for words. </p><p>Ryan strings soft, soothing kisses along it as if he knows. </p><p>They lie together for a long time, Ryan mouthing weakly at Shane’s throat, Shane’s fingers winding their way into Ryan’s hair. Ryan makes a grumpy, displeased sound when his cock slips out of him, so Shane dips his fingers down his spine, between the swell of his ass cheeks, playing with the trickle of come dripping out of him and then crooking two fingers back inside him to keep him filled.</p><p>Ryan goes slack against his chest, humming happily. </p><p>“I think your plug is under the bed,” Shane ventures.</p><p>“This is good,” Ryan mumbles. “Don’t you dare move. Being gross and sticky is a problem for future us.” </p><p>Shane nudges a third finger against the rim, marveling at the way Ryan gives a spasm of pleasure against him, so sensitive to the touch. “Excellent. Can’t make the future too easy on ourselves.”</p><p>Ryan titters. “Dunno if I ever said, but I love it when you call yourself daddy. It’s so freaking hot.” He yawns, tucking his head under Shane's chin. “And it means you're kind of into this too, you know? It’s confirmation I didn’t brainwash you into putting up with something you think is gross.”</p><p>Objectively speaking, they’re all kinds of gross at the moment. “You’re not gross,” Shane says quietly. “In the grand scheme of grossness, you’re one of the least gross things that’s ever happened to me.”</p><p>He feels rather than sees it when Ryan smiles. “Back atcha, buddy.”</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>The remainder of Ryan’s list emerges in a few different ways. Sometimes he shares his ideas via index cards, sometimes not. Sometimes there are frank, face to face conversations that make Shane’s nerves jangle with alarm, that make Ryan slip their hands and mouths together to ease him along. </p><p>And sometimes, less often, Shane lets himself initiate them. When he casually mentions handcuffs, Ryan obliges with the enthusiasm of Christmas morning. He spends a good hour getting Shane to pick out a few pairs online with him, and once they arrive he spends even longer sucking him off slow and thorough and messy as Shane’s wrists strain against the headboard. Even though it wasn’t part of the deal, Ryan pauses often to lavish him with praises that make his ears burn and his toes curl, telling him he’s proud of him for being brave and asking for what he wants. Ryan is so good at giving him what he needs without needing to be told, but when he is, the result is magnificent.</p><p>Another time, Ryan cagily brings up wanting to give exhibition another go. Not just in a going-public-with-their-relationship sort of way, he specifies, but in a borderline-public-indecency-without-getting-arrested way.</p><p>That one is the most interesting. Shane test-drives it when they’re on location and fucks him up against the window of their hotel room. He talks Ryan up about the idea of taking him out someplace, letting him dance and feel the weight of dozens of anonymous eyes on him while Shane strips him of his shirt. While he undoes his pants, lets everyone see how hard Ryan gets for him. Bends him over to show off how tight he is inside, how well he opens up for his fingers, how much he loves being daddy’s needy little slut. </p><p>They have to clean the window afterward, but it’s worth it.</p><p>Shane isn't actually sure if places like that even exist outside of arthouse films, but Ryan is so into the idea that they investigate and find an open play night that happens to coincide with the next time they’re in New York. It’s in the basement of an unassuming Brooklyn building where phones are confiscated in mandatory storage lockers at the door. They're both fully clothed wallflowers at first, and Shane tries not to self-destruct from the sheer paranoia of running into a fan or someone from Buzzfeed New York. But then Ryan offers up his back for a wax play demo and lies face down on a leather-padded bench for it. Shane feels his brain dissolving by the moment every time he hisses and writhes and the muscles in his back shift in the candlelight. </p><p>He confesses to Ryan later that he’s not sure he’d ever do it again—the anxiety is just too close to outweighing the intrigue—but it’s a moment that nestles close to his heart when Ryan gathers him into his arms and thanks him for stepping outside his comfort zone.</p><p>Ryan picks up some soy candles after that. Shane finds them in the bathroom closet tucked between a stack of towels. The index card accompanying them reads <em> okay but seriously can we try the wax thing? </em> </p><p>The candles turn out to be a good investment because suddenly the pandemic hits and the two of them spend a lot of time entertaining each other behind closed doors.</p><p>They stay together in Shane's place and frantically form a contingency plan to keep Watcher afloat. </p><p>Their spare bedroom gets turned into an ad hoc recording studio, though sometimes one of them will set up in the living room instead for the sake of getting a little extra space. The chaotic energy of both of them in the same place is not for the faint of heart, and Steven’s heart might be gold-plated but they still try to respect his sanity. And if Ryan does Watcher Weekly videos wearing his loosest tank tops in order to get air flow to his wax-sensitive chest, no one knows it but Shane. If Ryan texts him <em> daddy can I fuck your pussy? </em> while Shane is pulling up Patreon questions on his phone, no one can say he's flustered for any reason other than the bizarre machinations of their fan base.</p><p>Eventually, the index cards taper off entirely because they don't need them. Ryan's calligraphy is reserved mostly for birthday cards, unnecessarily fancy responses on Top Five Beatdown, and writing obscenities on Shane's skin until he's begging to be touched. They venture into the world of couples therapy. (“We live together <em> and </em> work together; there are professionals specifically trained to make sure we can keep doing both for a long time,” Ryan insists. The <em> I want you around for a long time </em> goes unspoken but resonates through his words anyway, and Shane loves him so much he'd walk over hot coals to get to therapy if Ryan asked him to.) </p><p>They pour every ounce of energy into keeping their company and their relationship alive.</p><p>And, somehow, they pull it off. Somehow, against all obstacles, they thrive.</p><p>The word <em> love </em>perpetually lies somewhere on Shane’s tongue, sometimes just a sigh from slipping off. He clings to the barest shred self-control, digging in with all his might, so that it's never let loose in the heat of the moment. Until one day, when Ryan successfully flips an omelet and swoops Shane into a full-on tango dip in the middle of the kitchen, he lets that shred slip away for good. And for the life of him, he can’t ever figure out why the hell he was so concerned about hanging onto it to begin with.</p><p>They do okay.</p><p>There are times when Shane can’t stop smiling at how okay they’re doing. It’s kind of a problem, and he has no interest whatsoever in solving it.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>The last card that surfaces isn't from Ryan and it doesn’t show up until a year later. </p><p>Shane doesn’t know shit about calligraphy, but he knows how this works. He borrows one of Ryan’s pens, sticks the card in the refrigerator, and asks Ryan to go grab the leftover lo mein. </p><p>He assumes the position.</p><p>And he waits.</p><p>It’s a little verbose, which is different from Ryan's succinct cards. It's also two-sided, because Shane just has to leave loopholes and justifications in his wake.</p><p>They've survived a pandemic, starting a company from scratch, and moving in together. They're basically unstoppable. There’s nothing to be scared of. </p><p>And yet.</p><p>On one side, in Shane’s normal chicken scratch, it reads:</p><p>
  <em> Howdy! Quick caveat that this is ONLY if you want to!! No rush, no pressure, just putting the idea out there!!!  </em>
</p><p>And then, grade-school style, there's an arrow indicating Ryan should flip it over to read the other side. There, in Shane’s neatest penmanship, it says: </p><p>
  <em> Get married.  </em>
</p><p>There's a small, strangled noise from the kitchen.</p><p>Ryan emerges a moment later, looking ready to jump out of his own skin.</p><p>Shane holds his breath, poised on one knee in their living room, holding the coveted cup of the History Master with a brushed velvet ring box balanced on top. His heart is thrumming a mile a minute, but somehow he's perfectly calm, secure in the knowledge that he's exactly where he needs to be.</p><p>He's ready.</p><p>
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